Item — HN Reader

Germany is exiting both nuclear and coal. In the time from 2010 to 2022 where 14/17 of nuclear plants were shut down generation from coal was reduced from 263 TWh per year to 181 TWh. Renewables increased from 105 TWh to 254 TWh. I also would have preferred to leave the nuclear plants running longer and exit coal faster, but in the overall scheme of things it does not matter too much. Nuclear is basically irrelevant. It is too expensive and slow to build. In reality, renewables will take over everything very quickly.

Gas and coal imports from Russia stopped completely. But guess what still depends on Russia: The nuclear industry in Europe and the US.

1 comments

Too bad numbers don't work when it's a quiet night, and you have to burn gas, caol, and biomass to make up for those nuclear reactors you've shut down: https://twitter.com/energybants/status/1647799729734971396

Also, the reason this is only possible at all is that Germany uses the rest of Europe as a giant battery to manage the non-dispatchability of renewables. The import-export balance often changes by as much as one third of Germany consumption in 12 hours [1].

The electricity prices are also becoming zero[2] in Germany during parts of the day, which is a great outcome only on the surface. As this progresses, the consequence will be that renewable electricity producers aren't getting paid during their prime generating hours. This means even more subsidies will be required going forward to bring additional production. It will become more apparent once the reserve of easily dispatchable electricity sources is fully tapped to balance renewables across Europe. We will see very high prices during mornings and evenings and whenever it's cold and dark. The fossil fuel plants that are turned on during these periods will need to earn enough to address the additional wear due to quick power cycling and to keep being maintained for the rest of the time when they are unused.

[1] - https://www.smard.de/page/en/marktdaten/78?marketDataAttribu...

[2] - https://www.nordpoolgroup.com/en/Market-data1/Dayahead/Area-...

The grid is for trade, so I am not sure what sense this complaint makes. Also France relies on imports sometimes. Electricity prices changing with production and demand is also exactly what market is for. As long as the market is working, this is beneficial to buyer and seller and changing prices are signals that allow the market to optimize production and consumption. Even when the price becomes zero sometimes, that does not mean than renewables need more subsidies if they earn money at other times where the price is higher. Also Germany still has enough of conventional generation capacity to ramp up production if needed, so the "is possible at all because" comment is wrong. If there is trade, then because this is cheaper overall (and in general this helps buyer and seller).

> As long as the market is working, this is beneficial to buyer and seller and changing prices are signals that allow the market to optimize production and consumption.

The market will always look to extract the highest possible price from the consumer.

> If there is trade, then because this is cheaper overall (and in general this helps buyer and seller).

Strange how "cheaper overall" fantasy is "consumer energy prices have quintupled in the past few years" in reality

> dispatchable electricity sources is fully tapped to balance renewables across Europe. We will see very high prices during mornings and evenings and whenever it's cold and dark

It's already a problem in Sweden. It exports electricity to Germany when demand is high... which leaves nothing to Sweden, and the prices skyrocket. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-08-12/swedish-m...

The prices in summer were so high mainly because half of France nuclear plants were offline. Look, even the article you cite mentions this: "The largest Nordic nation became the region’s top exporter in the first half after France suffered problems at its aging reactors"

Sorry, I am not interested what a nuclear shill posts on twitter. Here is the source for my numbers (which are the official ones). Sorry, in German but I assume you can guess the labels: https://ag-energiebilanzen.de/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/STR...

Again: total numbers mean absolutely nothing on a night when there's zero production from renewables.

That "shill" is showing data. Just the fact that you don't like this data doesn't make it invalid.

Right now it's night in Germany, and even though the wind is blowing, it's only at 40% generation. And look, there's coal, supplying 22%, and gas supplying another 9%: https://imgur.com/a/3bYudyd

So what? You are complaining that Germany still uses coal. This is a fair complaint (and one should complain about this), but Germany is in the middle of the transition to renewables and that in the middle of the transition you still use coal does not tell you that the transition is not working. In fact, there are plenty of simulation studies which show that it will work. We also know that nuclear will have no meaningful impact in fighting climate change because it is too expensive and too slow to build.

> but Germany is in the middle of the transition to renewables and that in the middle of the transition you still use coal does not tell you that the transition is not working.

No, it shows that people believe in bullshit and actively hurt their own clean power generation capabilities due to decades of FUD.

And yes, however many renewables you build, you still have no answer for intermittent power generation.

> We also know that nuclear will have no meaningful impact in fighting climate change because it is too expensive and too slow to build.

Strange how some countries build them relatively fast (China can builds 1 reactor in 6 years, building several reactors in parallel, see Fuqing Nuclear Power Plant) while e.g. in Europe after three decades of FUD, scremongering and underinvestment, we not only believe they can't be built fast enough, but can't build them either.