[Plantagenet]

For a +4K world we must keep our lignite in the ground ...

So keep your lignite coal in the ground.

Almost every other country in the developed world is smart enough to realize that coal-fired power plants are huge CO2 producers. Other countries are shutting down their coal-fired power plants, not building new ones.

What the heck is wrong with Germany that they can't figure out that by building new coal-fired power plants they are INCREASING their CO2 production and blowing a hole in any hope to reduce global CO2 emissions.

[Graeme]

The 3% Solution

Executive summary

Businesses face increasing risks to growth, productivity and supply chains from climate change, as the frequency and severity of extreme weather events such as droughts, floods, and storms increases.

Those risks are expected to grow. Increasing the global average temperature more than 2°C above pre-industrial levels – a path we are now on – would cross a threshold beyond which climate change is expected to have longterm, irreversible, and dangerous effects. Scientists say we need to substantially reduce emissions to have a fair chance of achieving the goal of not crossing the 2°C increase threshold.3

But this is not a report about the potentially crippling business and societal risks of exceeding 2°C. The purpose of this report is to explore if the US corporate
sector can profitably reduce emissions between now and 2020 in line with this science-based goal.

World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and CDP commissioned this research to address three key questions:

1. How big is the gap between the level of emissions the US corporate sector is likely to reach by 2020 and the level of emissions required to avoid the 2°C increase threshold?

2. How much of that gap can be closed profitably by the
US corporate sector?

3. What other actions are needed for the US corporate sector to help stabilize the climate in the longer term?

In short, this report shows that business today can meet this goal profitably. Rather than focusing on threats, this report identifies novel approaches for the private sector to capture hundreds of billions of dollars in savings and create business opportunities by addressing climate change.

It builds on more than a decade of experience from leading companies that have begun the journey to address the challenge of climate change. From early efforts to measure and track emissions or improve internal efficiency, to more recent efforts to tackle emissions and efficiency in products and supply chains, these initiatives have flourished because they have yielded significant returns on investment and important reputational benefits.

The report reaches two main conclusions:

Business Faces a Gigatonne Challenge
To be on track to stay below 2°C, the US corporate sector must reduce total annual greenhouse gas emissions in 2020 by 1.2 gigatonnes of CO2e from 2010 levels.4 This is equivalent to annual reductions of approximately 3 percent per year across the US corporate sector.

The 3% Solution Can Drive $190 Billion of Net Savings in 2020
Based on this analysis, The 3% Solution can create a present value (PV) of net savings up to US$190 billion in 2020 for the US corporate sector5, excluding utilities. Between 2010 and 2020, the net present value (NPV) could
be as high as $780 billion.

Companies can capture these unrealized savings from three primary categories of activities: (1) improved energy efficiency through behavioral or management changes, (2) energy efficiency through technology improvements, and (3) the deployment of low-carbon energy, particularly rooftop solar photovoltaics (solar PV). The 3% Solution is entirely profitable, with profitable opportunities that vary across sectors (see exhibit on following page).

In addition to the cost savings opportunities in 2020, there is another gigatonne in emission reduction opportunities from utilities, consumers and supply chains.

Together, 2.2 GtCO2e of annual emissions reductions are achievable in 2020, almost double what is required to meet the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)’s 2020 minimum target of reducing emissions by 25% from 1990 levels.

[Graeme]

Fossil Fuel Really Beginning To Hate Renewable Energy: Graphs

This article follows on from our story yesterday on Alinta, and the complaint by CEO Jeff Dimery that wind energy is “undermining the running regime of exiting thermal generation assets”. There is no doubt that it is. But while some could argue whether this is a good thing (early retirement of ageing polluting assets in a clean energy transition) or a bad thing (stranded assets, loss of value), it seems that it is inevitable as the world transitions to an energy system based around renewables.

This series of graphs – taken from an expansive presentation of energy data collected by Germany’s Franhofer Institute for Sustainable Energy – gives some insight into why the owners of fossil fuel plants hate this scenario. The growing impact of wind farms and solar panels in Europe, and in Germany in particular, are having a massive impact on energy markets – and the impact is very much more an economic one than a technical one. The same is true in Australia, as we discussed yesterday.


Now let’s fast forward to just a few weeks ago. These next two graphs (below) tell us what happened in weeks 22 and 23, from May 27 to June 9. Germany’s 33GW of solar PV is now powering up, and larger fluctuations of wind power are also having an impact on the market.

The output from the nuclear and brown coal generators is dramatically lowered – their total weekly outputs in January were at least 50 per cent higher than in May, and their peak requirement was 25 per cent higher. The output of black coal generators has been slashed by nearly half in the latest period and has become highly variable (most have to shut down completely over the weekend and sometime overnight), and the demand for gas has fallen by more than half – even though it is used to fill gaps between wind and solar, it is rarely required to switch on for the daytime peaks.

These highlight some of the big problems with the growing penetration of renewables in Germany. Remember, at this level, the market is around 20 per cent, but the government wants this to rise to 40 per cent by 2030. Gas plants, however, are struggling to stay open. Coal generators in Germany – like Alinta and others in Australia – are screaming blue murder because they are being levered out of the market. Most of the new coal plants currently being built in Germany – even the brown coal ones – are designed to be flexible so they can fit in around renewables – which is now the dominant influence on prices in the market.


One of the irony about the production statistics is that when brown coal and nuclear were switched on near full capacity in January – most of their output was exported to other European countries. That’s because the fuel was surplus to requirements. In June, most of the solar was exported, while nuclear from France (the country with most excess capacity) was imported to fill in some of the gaps. That speaks to the importance of a big, interconnected market – something that will benefit South Australia when the interconnector is upgraded.

cleantechnica

[Tanada]

The output from the nuclear and brown coal generators is dramatically lowered – their total weekly outputs in January were at least 50 per cent higher than in May, and their peak requirement was 25 per cent higher. The output of black coal generators has been slashed by nearly half in the latest period and has become highly variable (most have to shut down completely over the weekend and sometime overnight), and the demand for gas has fallen by more than half – even though it is used to fill gaps between wind and solar, it is rarely required to switch on for the daytime peaks.

These highlight some of the big problems with the growing penetration of renewables in Germany. Remember, at this level, the market is around 20 per cent, but the government wants this to rise to 40 per cent by 2030. Gas plants, however, are struggling to stay open. Coal generators in Germany – like Alinta and others in Australia – are screaming blue murder because they are being levered out of the market. Most of the new coal plants currently being built in Germany – even the brown coal ones – are designed to be flexible so they can fit in around renewables – which is now the dominant influence on prices in the market.

One of the irony about the production statistics is that when brown coal and nuclear were switched on near full capacity in January – most of their output was exported to other European countries. That’s because the fuel was surplus to requirements. In June, most of the solar was exported, while nuclear from France (the country with most excess capacity) was imported to fill in some of the gaps. That speaks to the importance of a big, interconnected market – something that will benefit South Australia when the interconnector is upgraded.

[/quote]

The graph shown contradicts the text in the quote, to wit they say Brown Coal was shut in first when the graph clearly shows Hard coal was shut in to a much greater extent than Brown (soft) coal. This is a serious difference because on an energy per unit volume basis Brown coal releases more CO2 than Black coal on a kWh/ton basis. It is great that they are so successful generating power from wind and solar, but even doing so they clearly still need alternatives to supply power on calm cloudy nights. Black coal usage fell by 89% while Brown coal usage fell by only 35% and Fission fell by 17%. At night Solar fell 100% and on the rare calm days Wind fell 98%. One possible solution to the intermittentcy problem is to solve the storage problem, hopefully a permanent cost effective solution will be engineered soon. All the percentages I used were calculated from the figures included on the graph image.

[careinke]

Using your twisted logic, US businesses are not going to influence anyone, and because China and India are too dumb, the best strategy is to do nothing and watch your business fail. On the contrary, it is better to do something and try to lead the rest of the world like Germany is doing.

Yup. Such is the justification the republican uses for ethical non-compliance to avoid responsibility. It is not only a political tool, but a personal and moral failure as well. As if often the case, attention is reflected with ad-hominems and especially red-herrings calling attention to specific examples of imperfection, often described as "hypocrisy", "unpatriotic," "blah, blah, blah." The MO sounds like this: "we creationist don't have to take responsibility because (fill-in-the-blank with Obama, Gore, TheDevil, enviros, etc.) are not perfect. na na na na whine."

We used to lead the world in solutions. I have friends who were pioneers in solar energy business. I put up my first panels years ago. No help from the government, private industry, or religion. The Chinese get help from their big old commie government. We mostly get free-market platitudes. Or outright hostility from the hate-gore-obama crowd.

All this pointless finger pointing. Yet when the Dims had the Presidency, Congress, AND the Senate, they could accomplish nothing. I think they breathed a sigh of relief when 2010 came.

[kublikhan]

The problem is, that this example does not fit.

They decided to use wireless technologies, because it has been the cheaper option.

If you ignore the climate costs coal is cheaper than reneables for China, India & Co. ICE cras are cheaper than electric cars.
That's way developing countries use them.

The situation would be different if you would include climate costs, but the problem is, that you have to pay for the technology alone, bit costs/benefits are shared.

I agree. But I see no easy solution here. You propose that the solution is for the US to "share the costs of developing renewable power for developing nations". No nation on Earth has manage to provide for all of it's energy needs via renewable energy at anything close to the american standard of living. But you want not only that, but for the US to fund a worldwide energy revolution to transform the world's energy sector to be powered by renewable energy. Plus, expand out the world's energy generation capability so that it can provide enough energy to power a rise in the standard of living to something closer to the american level? Sounds like a utopian pipe dream to me with no basis in reality. According to recent reports, the world will need somewhere between $41 trillion - $71 trillion in infrastructure spending between now and 2030. However actual investment is significantly below that, estimated at $24 trillion over the next 20 years. That comes out to a global deficit of around $2 trillion per year. The US could not plug that gap even if it wanted to. Note that gap is just for the cheap fossil fueled infrastructure you were talking about, the icky stuff. If we wanted to build out not the cheap fossil fueled stuff, but the expensive renewable stuff, the costs would be significantly higher. The US does not have the ability to do what you are asking. Looking at the numbers from an EROEI view instead of a monetary view has numbers that are just as grim(see my last quote below).

in a 2007 report, Booz Allen Hamilton estimated the global investment in infrastructure needed for water and wastewater, power, roads/highways and rail, and ports and airports between 2005 and 2030 at about US$ 41 trillion. Since then, a report by Credit Suisse Group AG referenced predictions by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) that total new spending over the next 20 years could be as high as to $71 trillion.

But according to CG/LA Infrastructure, unless the world’s leading economies change the way they currently fund infrastructure development, they are more likely to invest about $24 trillion over the next 20 years. The PIR report assumed that the world is facing a global infrastructure deficit of US$2 trillion per year over the next 20 years based on the projections for future infrastructural development from the study by Booz Allen Hamilton.

Global Infrastructure Spending Estimated at $24 to $71 Trillion over 2010-2030

What you want is to keep the American way of life and telling others not to have it because it is bad. But you are not willing to pay for it, but ask others to do so.

This obviously does not work.

No, this is not what I think nor what I want. I think developed nations in general, and the US in particular, consume a disproportionate amount of resources and should reduce their consumption. However did you read that Robert Rapier report I linked to earlier(Global Carbon Dioxide Emissions — Facts and Figures? His conclusions are that in order to continue increasing their standard of living, developing nations are going to need to continue to consumer ever larger quantities of fossil fuels. Sure they might add some token renewables in the mix, but fossil fuel consumption will still continue to grow. As will their co2 emissions. As I stated earlier, US emissions could fall to zero and this would still be the case. You can talk all about fairness and punishing the evil US for past emissions, but it does not address the core issue of lowering current & future global co2 emissions.

BTW, from a developing world perspective, Germany is also one of those obese fellows in the boat telling the starving folks to go fish.

We will have international climate policy as soon as the US makes a SIGNIFICANT and believable move (fracking is the opposite). China will follow very soon, they are already way ahead of the US in long term climate policy.

I think actions speak louder than words. And the actions I see China taking are more coal, rising co2 emissions, more climate damage. While the US has less coal, falling co2 emissions, less climate damage. China is way ahead of the US one one thing though: co2 emissions. Half of the coal burned on the entire planet is burned in China. This does not sound like a good long term climate policy if you ask me.

Also, I don't see the developing world implementing a vast renewable power transformation just because the developed world does it. Such a transformation is likely to be very expensive, especially if you have to implement backup power and/or energy storage to compensate for intermittent renewables. Developing nations don't have the funds for this. Even developed nations are struggling with this, and they still get the majority of their energy from fossil fuels. I'm all for the development of renewable energy and post frequently on it's progress. But they are not a panacea for replacing fossil fuels. They are expensive, intermittent, and have a low EROEI. This is not a good combination for a nation looking to escape energy poverty. Not even with subsidies from the west.

What are the barriers to increased development of renewable energy in the developing world?
The number one barrier to renewable energy scale-up in the developing world is cost. Access to modern forms of electricity is crucial for both basic improvements in quality of life and for being able to develop a robust, modern economy. But most people in developing countries simply cannot afford the cost of electricity with increased renewables. They need policies that drive down the costs and increase the deployment of these technologies. Until clean power technologies reach full price parity with fossil fuels, even the best policies will come at an additional cost that can’t be borne by poor ratepayers in developing countries.

Despite the global energy crisis, people in developed countries take for granted having light at the flick of a switch. Not so in the developing world, where 2 billion people don’t have access to electricity, which is often a prerequisite to escaping poverty.

In the absence of grid electricity, which cash-strapped governments can’t afford, off-grid, renewable energy solutions are needed; and to date the off-grid solutions that have been attempted (solar, wind, etc.) have been too costly and unreliable (and therefore unscalable) for populations earning less than $2 a day.

Without viable alternatives, most of these populations must rely on kerosene lamps for lighting

Renewable energy is ideologically very attractive. After all, who would not want clean and "free" energy for everyone forever? Such ideological perfection can easily switch off the critical thinking of environmentally conscious individuals and this is exactly what we are seeing at the moment. This article will therefore attempt to reactivate some of that critical thinking.

Minimal impact on climate change
The first point to be made is that the chances of renewable energy being deployed at a rate sufficiently high to have a meaningful impact on climate change are slim to none. Leading energy authorities such as the IEA, BP, the EIA and Exxon all agree that renewable energy other than hydro will probably contribute about 5% of the global energy mix by 2035. By that time, atmospheric CO2 concentrations will already be well past 450 ppm. Even if all of these energy experts are off by 100% and renewable energy sources like solar, wind and biofuels contribute 10% of global energy by 2035, global CO2 emissions will still be increasing, rapidly driving atmospheric concentrations towards 550 ppm and beyond. Decarbonizing the energy sector by other means (e.g. CCS and nuclear) will be much more effective.

The price of intermittency
It is very convenient for renewable energy advocates to simply neglect the potentially very large costs associated with the intermittency of renewable energy. Adding battery packs capable of smoothing daily variations will roughly double the price of domestic solar PV, while chemical storage options capable of smoothing out longer-term variations lose about half of the original energy in the conversion process.

Insufficient energy return
The third point is related to Energy Return on Investment (EROI). A highly complex society (such as the developed world) where the vast majority of energy is used for a myriad of purposes other than energy harvesting places very high demands on the quality of energy resources. EROI expert, Charles Hall, estimates that we need an EROI of about 10:1 to maintain current societal complexity.

Solar and wind have an EROI of about 7:1 and 18:1 respectively, but this is before the effect of intermittency is accounted for. When 4 hours of battery storage is added to solar PV, the EROI drops to just over 2:1. This kind of EROI cannot even sustain the most basic of civilizations, which is a problem because we will need a very advanced civilization to make high-tech renewable energy work. This simply implies that we still require decades of basic RD&D before renewable energy hopefully reaches the point where it can realistically support our civilization.

The Renewable Energy Reality Check

[cephalotus]

Executive summary

... Increasing the global average temperature more than 2°C above pre-industrial levels – a path we are now on – would cross a threshold beyond which climate change is expected to have longterm, irreversible, and dangerous effects. Scientists say we need to substantially reduce emissions to have a fair chance of achieving the goal of not crossing the 2°C increase threshold.

We are not on a path to a +2K world, but to a +4K world and beyond.

There is no "fair chance" for a +2K world left, this opportunity has closed 5-10 years ago...

[cephalotus]

You propose that the solution is for the US to "share the costs of developing renewable power for developing nations". No nation on Earth has manage to provide for all of it's energy needs via renewable energy at anything close to the american standard of living.

I want the US to cut back emissions down to 1-2 t CO2e per person and year during the next 30-40 years. That's technologically possible and wouldn't cost much more than the Iraq war.

I'm asking the same for every rich nation on Earth.

Those, that do not get down to 1-2t CO2e/ person and year will have to pay poor countries to use their rights to emit CO2.

I would put that cap on actual population data, so the industrial nations face a significant technological task and the developing nations have to find solution for their population growth, probably adressing the two worst threats for this century.

Neither the US nor any other nation has to give "aid" to developing nations. Solar power now costs below 10USct/kWh, that's not because of some breakthrough technology from research institutes, but simply by introducing solar power to a mass market in developed nations like Japan or Germany and using the Chinese manufacturing power..

Now solar power is an economical viable option for poor countries like Bangladesh or a cheaper alternative to CO2 power for nations like Saudi Arabia.

Why not start a mass market in the US for electric cars and natural gas power trucks for example? Both need a mass market to become cheaper options.

However did you read that Robert Rapier report I linked to earlier(Global Carbon Dioxide Emissions — Facts and Figures?

Thanks for the link.

I do not agree but beleive that renewable are already a cheap option to power the needs of the third worlds electricity demand.
There is no need either to built buildings like we and the US did in the 1960th with huge needs for AC and heating. We have much better options now and are able to build new homes that are net energy producers during a year.
That's possible in cloudy German and at the same price as a conventional building. You just have to do it. It took 20-30 years to develop the technology, get the price down and learn from the early mistakes, but "passive homes" or "solar homes" are now a real option here.

The only problem is, that most decision makers don't know about those options or do not believe in them or some don't want to learn new things. I assume this takes another 20-30 years...

I also do not like the new argumentaion line in the US, that China and India is much worse and that you are ot able to do anything.
China and India will always hide behind the US and arguing, that the US has to make the first significant step and they are perfectly right in asking so. You still emit 3-10 times more CO2 per capita than India and China.

As I stated earlier, US emissions could fall to zero and this would still be the case. You can talk all about fairness and punishing the evil US for past emissions, but it does not address the core issue of lowering current & future global co2 emissions.

The core issue is very simple. No nation should be allowed to emit more than 1-2t CO2 / person in 2050 and less than 0,5t CO2 / person in 2100

If we achieve this it seems that we will be able to stop global warming most likely somewhere between +2K and +4K

It takes the will of EVERY nation to agree on this. If the 2md biggest CO2 emitter in the world (and the biggest if you use historical data) with a co2 emission of almost 20t / person and year explains to the world that they are not able to do anything about this, WHO do you think should be able?

What you are telling me is capitulation.

BTW, from a developing world perspective, Germany is also one of those obese fellows in the boat telling the starving folks to go fish.

We / I would agree on the target of reducing emissions to 1-2 t CO2e including our owns of course.

That's a starting point, a quite good staring point btw. (it would be analogues to comsume only as little food as is sustainable in the long term and get everyone to fish instead)

And the actions I see China taking are more coal, rising co2 emissions, more climate damage. While the US has less coal, falling co2 emissions, less climate damage.

I heard that so often now and I really wonder if you believe this? do you think the US has a great climate strategy just because you are (currently!) cheap fracking gas in your coal power plants?
This has nothing to do with climate policy, reducing Co2 emissions is just a side effect. As soon as coal become cheaper than gas you will switch back and as long as it doesn't you are exporting the coal.

China has signficant targets on renewable energies, the transport sector and CO2 impact / BIP.

China is a leader on electric 2 wheel vehicles. I have built two electric bikes that I use for my daily(!) commute thanks to Chinese development and technology. Just to give one example.

You can see a much more detailed report on the ranking of varoius nations regarding Co2 emissionion, targets and policy:

http://germanwatch.org/en/download/7158.pdf

There is no country on place 1-3.

#4 is Denmark
Germany is at #8
US at #43
China at #53

out of 58 countries

The US got quite good points for the trend in CO2 emissions (applauding the switch from coal to gas), but very low points for actual emissions or CO2 policy. China did MUCH better in climate policy.

China is way ahead of the US one one thing though: co2 emissions. Half of the coal burned on the entire planet is burned in China. This does not sound like a good long term climate policy if you ask me.

China emits 1/3rd of the US emissions per capita (the only fair method to compare countries) and this includes HUGE exports of goods from China to the US.

Also, I don't see the developing world implementing a vast renewable power transformation just because the developed world does it. Such a transformation is likely to be very expensive, especially if you have to implement backup power and/or energy storage to compensate for intermittent renewables.

Take the island of Capriciosa for example. They are now switching from Diesel power to wind+solar+ backup diesel power using a large NaS battery and technology from Germany.
They do this because it is cheaper than burning diesel.

They will reduce their CO2 emissions by around 70% in the electricity sector.

Saudi Arabia has a plan for 30+ GW of solar power, because solar power is already cheaper than burning oil.

China has the largest installed capacity of wind power (and mabye the largest capacity of PV solar power in 3-4 years), because it is a cheap option.

Developing nations don't have the funds for this.

I'm sure they have. This is a much more realistic option than nuclear power. Bangladesh now has more than 1 million solar home systems.
More than 90% of the installed world wide solar thermal capacity is on rooftops of Chinese homes.

Even developed nations are struggling with this, and they still get the majority of their energy from fossil fuels. I'm all for the development of renewable energy and post frequently on it's progress. But they are not a panacea for replacing fossil fuels. They are expensive, intermittent, and have a low EROEI. This is not a good combination for a nation looking to escape energy poverty. Not even with subsidies from the west.

They are more expensive than what you pay for your natural gas.

Do you think that you pay the true price for fracking gas? Do you think that you pay the true price for nuclear power? We don't.

In the absence of grid electricity, which cash-strapped governments can’t afford, off-grid, renewable energy solutions are needed; and to date the off-grid solutions that have been attempted (solar, wind, etc.) have been too costly and unreliable (and therefore unscalable) for populations earning less than $2 a day.

Have a look at Bangladesh

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/1 ... ?mobile=nc

Without viable alternatives, most of these populations must rely on kerosene lamps for lighting

A Chinese solar LED lamp is cheaper than a kerosene lamp. we do not even have to count the savings for fuel or the health threats. It's cheaper from the very first day.

The first point to be made is that the chances of renewable energy being deployed at a rate sufficiently high to have a meaningful impact on climate change are slim to none. Leading energy authorities such as the IEA, BP, the EIA and Exxon all agree that renewable energy other than hydro will probably contribute about 5% of the global energy mix by 2035.

the same experts that said 20 years ago that solar PV will reach 3GW world wide capacity in 2030. A capacity that Germany installed in one month?

the same experts that predicted 4,000 nuclear reactors by now?

The same experts that predicted the oil price to go down to 20US$/barrel for 2030 in the year 2006?

By that time, atmospheric CO2 concentrations will already be well past 450 ppm. Even if all of these energy experts are off by 100% and renewable energy sources like solar, wind and biofuels contribute 10% of global energy by 2035, global CO2 emissions will still be increasing, rapidly driving atmospheric concentrations towards 550 ppm and beyond. Decarbonizing the energy sector by other means (e.g. CCS and nuclear) will be much more effective.

Yes, the CO2 emissions will increase.

The ONLY option to keep the levels below 550ppm (450ppm is a wet dream, we are already at 400ppm) is to keep our fossil fuels in the ground.

this means that you have to stop fracking immediately.

If you believe that CCS and nuclear is faster and cheaper than wind + solar, do it. Just do it. I believe that solar + wind is MUCH cheaper than CCS + nuclear.

UK is now suggesting a feed in traif for their next nuclear power plant of 11,5€ct/kWh for 40 years. That#s already more than 2 times as expensive than solar power in cloudy Germany. And we are not talking about waste management or insurance here.

But if the US or China uses nuclear + CCS this is perfectly fine for me.

It is very convenient for renewable energy advocates to simply neglect the potentially very large costs associated with the intermittency of renewable energy.

We had 61% solar+wind during an hour last weekend in Germany. That did work quite well. Having to much RE is not a unsolvable technological problem, having to little isn't either as long as you are adding RE to an existing fossil fuel mix.

Many "experts" claimed that a grid would collapse at more than 30% renewables from wind + solar.

they are quite silent now.

Adding battery packs capable of smoothing daily variations will roughly double the price of domestic solar PV, while chemical storage options capable of smoothing out longer-term variations lose about half of the original energy in the conversion process.

We have better and cheaper options to get to a 90%+ RE grid than using small battery systems.
We are already testing some of them.

The third point is related to Energy Return on Investment (EROI). A highly complex society (such as the developed world) where the vast majority of energy is used for a myriad of purposes other than energy harvesting places very high demands on the quality of energy resources. EROI expert, Charles Hall, estimates that we need an EROI of about 10:1 to maintain current societal complexity.

Solar and wind have an EROI of about 7:1 and 18:1 respectively,

Enercon claims an EROI of around 30:1 for their wind power plants, Heliathek (a new player for organic solar cells) claims an EROI of around 40:1 for their modules (not counting BOS, so maybe 30:1).
First Solar claims 25:1 for entire power plants.
We have recycling systems for old Pv modules and get the energy use of producing PV modules made of aluminium frames, glass, tedlar and c-Si wafers down to the factor of 10.
This is with test facilities.

but this is before the effect of intermittency is accounted for. When 4 hours of battery storage is added to solar PV, the EROI drops to just over 2:1.

2:1 is the quote for a solar home, which I doubt, but I didn't read the study, because the EROI of a solar home with battery backup is completely irrelevant for the storage needs of a nation wide grid (which is already in place).
we do need around 1/100th to 1/1000th of short term storage (that needs not to be batteries btw) per kWh in the grid compared to an off grid house.

Having an "expert" quoting that solar home number for the entire grid just shows his complete incompetence on the topic.

(a short look at his CV shows his agenda: "...My current research focus is on second generation CO2 capture processes...")

Btw: Swiss EMPA made a LCA on lithium ion batteries (for electric cars) and their ecological footprint is not significant, the main factor is aluminium and copper and both of it is perfectly recyclable. Germany already produced 90% of its aluminium from recycling.

This kind of EROI cannot even sustain the most basic of civilizations,

Your numbers are wrong imho. Germany produces some GW of wind and solar capacity each year and if you use a life time of 20 years and this would be euqivalent to around 100-200 TWh/a of future energy production. With an EROI of just 1:7 or 1:8 this would mean an energy effort of 13-20TWh/a which simply is not plausible.

which is a problem because we will need a very advanced civilization to make high-tech renewable energy work. This simply implies that we still require decades of basic RD&D before renewable energy hopefully reaches the point where it can realistically support our civilization.

Tell this to the people of Bangladesh. They should dismount their expensive solar panels and live agin in the dark and wait for decades of Basic R&D instead...

That'st the difference of German and US climate policy.

we do something (not always perfect, but we try), your are hiding behind China and are quoting experts that tell you what things are not possible...

Afair you are willing to pay around 1 billion US$ for your new F-35 fighters. (I don't follow the actual data)

Obviously EROI or costs are not a problem here. Do you think that you will lose a war without them?

Sorry, but for me US climate policy is nothing but hiding, denial and lying behind false numbers and paid experts from the fossil fuel lobby and a population that has zero interest in it...

[Plantagenet]

China emits 1/3rd of the US emissions per capita (the only fair method to compare countries)

China is the biggest CO2 polluter on the planet.

The idea that China and every other country on earth has a god-given right to increase their CO2 emission until their per-capita CO2 output matches the USA is madness.

Rather than making excuses for countries like China to keep increasing their already huge CO2 emissions, it would be smarter to work to REDUCE global CO2 emissions.

Just as the USA is currently reducing their CO2 emissions, other countries should be doing the same --- We'll never reduce global CO2 emssions if selfish countries make excuses to continue to increase their CO2 output by building new coal-fired power plants, as China, India, Germany and some other benighted countries continue to do.

[cephalotus]

China is the biggest CO2 polluter on the planet.

They have the most people in the world.

The idea that China and every other country on earth has a god-given right to increase their CO2 emission until their per-capita CO2 output matches the USA is madness.

To me this does not sound more mad than an US that says that we have the right to pollute and drill like there is no morning, but others don't.
In the end the US says "fuck the climate, we have been the worst polluter ever, but we don't want to do anything about it, we now use some fracking gas instead of coal, this must be enough..."

Rather than making excuses for countries like China to keep increasing their already huge CO2 emissions, it would be smarter to work to REDUCE global CO2 emissions.

Sure. So how much should China and Germany reduce their emissions and how much is the US willing to reduce it?

Just as the USA is currently reducing their CO2 emissions, other countries should be doing the same ---

If Germany will "reduce" the emissions similar to the US and we take the year 1965 for example we should start to built 100 new coal power plants.
Germanys CO2 emissions are way below 1965 while the US emisisons today are much higher than they had been in 1965.
You have LOT to do just to be equal to the CO2 reductions Germany has achieved (and this includes using lignite and abondoning nuclear).

we also have much lower CO2 emissions per capita and also much lower CO2 emissions per GDP AND we alos have a significant trade surplus.

It sounds a bit strange if you tell me that we should look at the great achievments of he US because they are laughable in comparions (and ours are far from enough, too)

We'll never reduce global CO2 emssions if selfish countries make excuses to continue to increase their CO2 output by building new coal-fired power plants, as China, India, Germany and some other benighted countries continue to do.

Germanys new coal power plants will mostly replace older less efficient ones and Germanys new coal power plants are designed to operate very flexible to complement large amounts of renewables. We need them until 2050 to have power during those times when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine. Germany has quite dark winters...

If the US has a plan to get a 90% renewable grid (and you have MUCH better sun,water, wind and biomass resources than we do) without using coal, fine.

It's our political decision to reduce our CO2 emissions by 80-90% until 2050 (compared to 1990) and this is quite ambitious. we believe that we need some coal power to balance renewables (we lack own gas resources, maybe we will import cheap liquid gas from the US instead, you seam to have enough?).

[kublikhan]

I heard that so often now and I really wonder if you believe this? do you think the US has a great climate strategy just because you are (currently!) cheap fracking gas in your coal power plants? This has nothing to do with climate policy, reducing Co2 emissions is just a side effect.

I don't think the reduction in co2 emissions where the result of great climate strategy, not primarily anyway. The new EPA clean air regulations are a factor here, but I agree with you that the primary factor was low natural gas prices. However calling it a "side effect" misses the point. The main goal here is lower co2 emissions. If we accomplish that goal in a manner you did not expect, that does not make the achievement any less meaningful.

As soon as coal become cheaper than gas you will switch back

I debunked this earlier in the thread. Did you miss this link: Comeback in coal-fired power generation may be short-lived

and as long as it doesn't you are exporting the coal.

It's true, there has been some pickup in US coal exports. But seeing as how much of this is going to you guys in Europe, it seems hypocritical for you to bitch about it wouldn't you say? Also, with the bulk of the coal trade shifting to Asia, this also shifts the transportation advantage in coal away from the US. Simple proximity issues, the other guys are closer. The distances involved mean we will always be at a disadvantage supplying coal to Asia compared to coal exporters like Indonesia, Australia, South Africa, etc.

Even if the industry continued to see robust exports, which unfortunately is not the case as exports are slowing, China's increasing dominance of the seaborne coal trades cannot possibly be a good thing for U.S. producers. China has been and will likely continue to be a wildcard. In some months China appears to have an insatiable appetite for imports. At other times, China's absence from the seaborne market causes coal prices to swoon.

A big problem for U.S. producers is location, location, location. Several major coal exporting countries are better situated to export coal to China. Australia and Indonesia are the largest exporters in the world, Australia especially in coking coal and Indonesia in thermal coal. Colombia and South Africa have better transport logistics to a key importing market, India. Taken together, an emerging block of countries, most notably Mozambique, are moving up the export curve as well.

Exports in 2013 will be less than 2012, and 2014 is highly uncertain. Exports aren't expected to collapse, but what producers really need is a 10%-15% increase, per year. However, the EIA is forecasting a 10% decline in 2013 vs. 2012.

Conclusion
China's dominance in coal consumption, not necessarily worthy of bragging about given the associated environmental concerns, is not likely to change anytime soon. This is not good for U.S. coal producers who suffer from a transportation disadvantage into Asia. In good times, everyone wins, but the coal market is not experiencing good times. It's difficult to name any good reasons to own coal stocks at this time. The coal industry in the United States has been in a state of flux since the arrival of a cheaper alternative for energy production: natural gas.

China Burns Half of World's Coal - Good or Bad for U.S. Producers?

Have a look at Bangladesh

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/1 ... ?mobile=nc

Thanks for the link, this is a very encouraging sign and I see it as a positive development. But lets not pretend that this is grid parity. First, it is subsidized. Both with direct cash payments and zero interest loans. Second, it is intermittent. Sure, it's a step up from nasty kerosene lamps but it is still pretty far from the 24/7 grid reliability we have in developed countries. I'd be interested in reading about Capriciosa island and it's NAS battery if you have a link, I could not seem to find any info on it.

We had 61% solar+wind during an hour last weekend in Germany. That did work quite well. Having to much RE is not a unsolvable technological problem, having to little isn't either as long as you are adding RE to an existing fossil fuel mix.

Many "experts" claimed that a grid would collapse at more than 30% renewables from wind + solar.

they are quite silent now.

Oh, I wouldn't go that far. The intermittent issue is not an unsolvable technical problem, but it is causing real problems. An off grid solar lighting system may be working ok in Bangladesh, but that is a far cry from the 24/7 electricity the developed world has become accustomed to. And instead of energy storage, it seems Germany is rely on coal power plants and emergency diesel generators. Isn't that what we were trying to get away from? I am more bothered by industry having to purchase diesel generators as backup power. The grid should provide backup power for intermittent renewables. Even if it has to by icky coal it's better than forcing every power consumer out there to go and install their own backup power. I hope Germany fixes this issue soon, I'd hate to see it's renewable program lose steam.

Germany is phasing out its nuclear plants in favor of wind and solar energy backed-up by coal power. The government’s transition to these intermittent green energy technologies is causing havoc with its electric grid and that of its neighbors–countries that are now building switches to turn off their connection with Germany at their borders. The intermittent power is causing destabilization of the electric grids causing potential blackouts, weakening voltage and causing damage to industrial equipment.

The instability of the electric grid is just one of many issues that the German government is facing regarding its move to intermittent renewable technologies. As we have previously reported, residential electricity prices in Germany are some of the highest in Europe and are increasing dramatically (currently Germans pay 34 cents a kilowatt hour compared to an average of 12 cents in the United States). This year German electricity rates are about to increase by over 10 percent due mainly to a surcharge for using more renewable energy and a further 30 to 50 percent price increase is expected in the next ten years. These changes in the electricity generation market have caused about 800,000 German households to no longer be able to afford their energy bills.

The Destabilization Problem
To illustrate the problem that renewable energy instability can cause, here is an example. When the voltage from German’s electric grid weakened for just a millisecond at 3 am, the machines at Hydro Aluminum in Hamburg ground to a halt, production stopped, and the aluminum belts snagged, hitting machines and destroying a piece of the mill with damages amounting to $12,300 to the equipment. The voltage weakened two more times in the next three weeks, causing the company to purchase its own emergency system using batteries, costing $185,000.

These short interruptions to the German electric grid increased by 29 percent and the number of service failures increased 31 percent over a 3-year period, with about half of those failures leading to production stoppages causing damages ranging from ten thousand to hundreds of thousands of Euros. These power grid fluctuations in Germany are causing major damage to a number of industrial companies, who have responded by getting their own power generators and regulators to help minimize the risks. However, companies warn that they might be forced to leave if the government does not deal with the issues quickly.

In the meantime, Germany’s neighbors, Poland and the Czech Republic, are taking action on Germany’s use of their power grid that Germany undertook without asking permission and without paying for its use. These countries are building a huge switch-off at their borders to block the import of green energy that is destabilizing their grids and causing potential blackouts in their countries. This action by German’s neighbors fragments the European electrical grid, turning Germany into an electrical island.

Ironically, to back-up the wind and solar energy, German utilities are using coal.

Conclusion
The high use of renewable energy in eastern Germany driven by government green energy policies is causing instability to its own electric grid as well as to neighboring countries, resulting in industrial companies having to purchase generators and emergency back-up systems rather than face replacing equipment damaged during disruptions of service. Electricity bills are also expected to go up by 10 percent this year. With residential electricity prices in Germany already about 3 times higher than prices in the United States and increasing further, it is no wonder that 800,000 German households can’t afford their electricity bills.

Germany’s Green Energy Destabilizing Electric Grids

2:1 is the quote for a solar home, which I doubt, but I didn't read the study, because the EROI of a solar home with battery backup is completely irrelevant for the storage needs of a nation wide grid (which is already in place).
we do need around 1/100th to 1/1000th of short term storage (that needs not to be batteries btw) per kWh in the grid compared to an off grid house.

Having an "expert" quoting that solar home number for the entire grid just shows his complete incompetence on the topic.

Yeah, those numbers do seem a bit off. I agree with you the grid can get economies of scale advantages with backup power, storage, long distance transmission, etc and looking at a solar house is not a good example. I also agree with your point about recycling solar pv panels at the end of their life increasing their EROEI(or the next generation's EROEI). I haven't crunched the numbers, but perhaps this will even overwhelm the lost EROEI from backup/storage issues? Definitely a plus in any case.

which is a problem because we will need a very advanced civilization to make high-tech renewable energy work. This simply implies that we still require decades of basic RD&D before renewable energy hopefully reaches the point where it can realistically support our civilization.

Tell this to the people of Bangladesh. They should dismount their expensive solar panels and live agin in the dark and wait for decades of Basic R&D instead...

You're missing the point. The R&D to develop those solar panels did not happen in Bangladesh. The subsidies for the panels and loans did not originate in Bangladesh. It was all developed on the back of an abundance of high EROEI fossil fuel energy in an advanced economy. And if we had to rely on 7:1 solar EROEI from now on, that could spell real problems for our energy supply going forward. Especially if the EOREI falls further once you factor in building backup power and/or storage. It might not be a big deal when the sun passes behind a cloud and the lights dim in a Bangladesh village. But is it a big deal if a factory churning out solar PV panels in Germany seizes up and experiences equipment damage from voltage fluctuations and brownouts in an unstable grid.

That'st the difference of German and US climate policy.

we do something (not always perfect, but we try), your are hiding behind China and are quoting experts that tell you what things are not possible...

Afair you are willing to pay around 1 billion US$ for your new F-35 fighters. (I don't follow the actual data)

Obviously EROI or costs are not a problem here. Do you think that you will lose a war without them?

Sorry, but for me US climate policy is nothing but hiding, denial and lying behind false numbers and paid experts from the fossil fuel lobby and a population that has zero interest in it...

Ick, you are doing it again. You still have this "us vs them" mentality. Don't you realize we are all in the same boat? If the boat is sinking, we should be focusing our efforts on the problem at hand, not pointing fingers at who caused the problem. You are even going off topic in your efforts to smear the US talking about jet fighters now :/ I don't like alot of policies in the US, but can we please stick to the topic of energy and co2?

They have the most people in the world.

They have 1/5 the world's population. Yet they burn half the world's coal. Don't you think something is wrong there? Especially in a country you praise for it's climate policy?

Germanys CO2 emissions are way below 1965 while the US emisisons today are much higher than they had been in 1965.

Not per capita. Per capita, US co2 emissions are at a 50 year low.

Adjusted for the population, CO2 emissions per capita last year were the lowest since 1964, almost 50 years ago. According to Department of Energy forecasts, the decline in per capita CO2 emissions is expected to continue so consistently that within about 20 years, greenhouse gas emissions per person in the US will be below the level in 1949!

As we observe Earth Day on April 22, we should celebrate the fact that we have “rolled back the carbon clock” by almost 50 years on a per capita basis in the US, and CO2 emissions per capita are expected to fall within the next 20 years to the lowest level in almost a century.

Energy fact of the day: US CO2 emissions per capita in 2012 were the lowest since 1964

[Plantagenet]

The idea that China and every other country on earth has a god-given right to increase their CO2 emission until their per-capita CO2 output matches the USA is madness.

To me this does not sound more mad

Every person in China, India, Germany and Greece and the rest of the world is not going to be able to have a big house in the suburbs and two cars in the garage and an American style lifestyle.

There aren't enough resources on the planet to support billions of people living at a US level of affluence.


Read "The Limits to Growth"---it demonstrates that there aren't enough resources on the planet to support billions of people living at a US level of affluence.

[cephalotus]

Read "The Limits to Growth"---it demonstrates that there aren't enough resources on the planet to support billions of people living at a US level of affluence.

I did read it and the 20 year, 30 year and 40 year update and now I'm reading the new report from Club of Rome "der geplünderte Planet" (don't know the English title, but its about resource depleting)

We both agree that the current lifestyle is far from sustainable.

We disagree how we should approach that problem. I want a fair share for everyone in the future from what's leftover, you want to have 1/4th of the resources for 1/25th of the population.

I assume that the atmospheres and seas capabilities to absorb CO2 is the limiting factor, so thankfully you are not able to take what you want by force. Either most of all countries agree or we will go under all together....

[Plantagenet]

you want to have 1/4th of the resources for 1/25th of the population.

???

You are having a fantasy. I never said that.

you are not able to take what you want by force.....

????

More made-up verruckt delusions.

C--Put your mind at ease ---- I don't want anything you've got. --- Think about it---I'm certainly not going to travel to Germany to take anything from you and I'd have to pay extra baggage fees on the airline to get it back to Alaska anyway.


Gehen C Verruckt?

[cephalotus]

However calling it a "side effect" misses the point. The main goal here is lower co2 emissions. If we accomplish that goal in a manner you did not expect, that does not make the achievement any less meaningful.

No, the main goal is lower prices. If gas gets more expensive again (which some people expect) you will return to cheaper coal again.

Did you miss this link: Comeback in coal-fired power generation may be short-lived

I read:

"...The Energy Information Administration expects that coal will be used to produce 39.1 percent of the country’s total electricity generation in 2013 and 2014, up from 37.4 percent last year. This is due to rising natural gas prices...."

This is with just a little increase in gas prices.

We will have to wait and see what happens in the future.

and as long as it doesn't you are exporting the coal.

It's true, there has been some pickup in US coal exports. But seeing as how much of this is going to you guys in Europe, it seems hypocritical for you to bitch about it wouldn't you say? Also, with the bulk of the coal trade shifting to Asia, this also shifts the transportation advantage in coal away from the US. Simple proximity issues, the other guys are closer. The distances involved mean we will always be at a disadvantage supplying coal to Asia compared to coal exporters like Indonesia, Australia, South Africa, etc.
[/quote]

the point is that you are digging out that coal. Digging out means burning means CO2 to the atmosphere.

You are extrecting as much fossil fuels as you can get and you don't care about environmental impacts. I fail to see a climate startegy there, it's just about money, nothing else 8of course this is similar with other countries, too)

A big problem for U.S. producers is location, location, location. Several major coal exporting countries are better situated to export coal to China.

Just keep it in the ground. If we don't want to exceed a +4K world we are not to allow to burn any coal. You want Germany to keep ist coal in the ground (which is the only fossil fuel resource that we have) while you are extracting coal AND oil AND gas AND unconventional fossil fuels like mad.

Hardly a starting point for any climate negotiations

Australia and Indonesia are the largest exporters in the world, Australia especially in coking coal and Indonesia in thermal coal. Colombia and South Africa have better transport logistics to a key importing market, India. Taken together, an emerging block of countries, most notably Mozambique, are moving up the export curve as well.

I already realised that you will always find something else to blame more.

Thanks for the link, this is a very encouraging sign and I see it as a positive development. But lets not pretend that this is grid parity.

what grid?

First, it is subsidized. Both with direct cash payments and zero interest loans. Second, it is intermittent.

Where did you find that those interest rates are zero and is this relevant?

Intermittent is not a problem, because the use battery storage. And having electricity 95% of the year is better than having no electricty at all.

I'd be interested in reading about Capriciosa island and it's NAS battery if you have a link, I could not seem to find any info on it.

Ah, I always mix up the names. Here is some public information: http://www.younicos.com/de/projekte/graciosa/index.html

Graciosa is home to 4500 people.

They will replace two of the four Diesel generators with 5,5MW wind power plants, 0,5MW solar power plant and a 2,5MW NaS storage system. They expect to go online in 2014 and expect to get the share of renewables up to 70%.
the tarif rate for the people will stay the same, but quality of the electricty grid will improve significantly. They have plans to bring the RE share up to 100% in the future.

I have more detailled analyses and calculations but those are not available to the public.

They tested the system already at 1:3 scale with real wind, solar and demand data in Berlin.

And instead of energy storage, it seems Germany is rely on coal power plants and emergency diesel generators. Isn't that what we were trying to get away from?

No. you don't built a storage system for 30 hours per year.

We already integrated 20% of renewables in our grid and this brings little technical, but some economical problems. the next step is 40% renewables. New storage system is not really needed to do that, but residual power plants need to get more flexible. we switch off the last nuclear until 2022, so these will not make problems, but we have to replace or retrofit our coal power plants. the capacity will increase, but amount of burnt coal will decrease.

Switching off nuclear AND coal is asking a bit to much in the current situation. We could do that at some cost and dependence on Russian gas, but why should we? From the 10 largest CO2 emittents we are the only nation that is now within the Kyoto targets.

here is what's available from a detailed analyses from German VDE, its the "association of the power plant operators":

http://www.vde.com/de/Verband/Pressecen ... f_v1_1.pdf

(if you want the entire study you have to pay for it)

We build some storage systems for experimental usage and we will build some for grid stability (maintaining 5frequency, 15 minute reserve capacity, etc...), but not that type of storage people think about.

they are NOT needed in Germany in the next 10 years, so why should we build them now?

I am more bothered by industry having to purchase diesel generators as backup power.

Why? Grid reliability in Germany is one of the highest in the world.

The grid should provide backup power for intermittent renewables. Even if it has to by icky coal it's better than forcing every power consumer out there to go and install their own backup power. I hope Germany fixes this issue soon, I'd hate to see it's renewable program lose steam.

exactly that's why we are building new power plants.

the real problem is that new power plants are not interesting to investors, because electricity prices are way to low now and runtime hours are to short.
THIS is a real concern now.

residential electricity prices in Germany are some of the highest in Europe and are increasing dramatically (currently Germans pay 34 cents a kilowatt hour compared to an average of 12 cents in the United States).

That's true but this isn't a real problem. we just pay it. I will pay 50€ct/kWh electricity if I need to do so. I think this is still cheap enough.

This year German electricity rates are about to increase by over 10 percent due mainly to a surcharge for using more renewable energy and a further 30 to 50 percent price increase is expected in the next ten years. These changes in the electricity generation market have caused about 800,000 German households to no longer be able to afford their energy bills.

That's nonsense. The same 800.000 households have not been able to afford electricity 20 years ago and they are not able to afford healthy food 8whch is super cheap over here) and they are not able to afford private insurance, etc. pp.
But they are able to afford a new smartphone every 3 months, 3 packages of cigarettes a day and the newest flat screen TV every year.

Most people complain about electricity prices like they complaining about gas prices or restaurant prices or the weather and they just move on the next day.

If you know Germany you now how you have to read those "reports". I know nobody how has problems to pay the electricty bills, but I know many people how even don't know and don't care how much they pay.
switching the electricty provider is a act of 5 mouseklicks and 2 minutes on the net and you can easily save a few percent if doing so, but yet 80% of the Germans don't care.

I switched to 100% renewable energies some years ago (backup is water power) and I even pay more than average, just because it doesn't matte to me.

our electricity consumption is not compareable to an American household, so in the end most Germans pay less for electricity than most Americans.

On the other spectrum the heavy industry enjoys super cheap electricity now.

To illustrate the problem that renewable energy instability can cause, here is an example. When the voltage from German’s electric grid weakened for just a millisecond at 3 am, the machines at Hydro Aluminum in Hamburg ground to a halt, production stopped, and the aluminum belts snagged, hitting machines and destroying a piece of the mill with damages amounting to $12,300 to the equipment. The voltage weakened two more times in the next three weeks, causing the company to purchase its own emergency system using batteries, costing $185,000.

Sure. On the other hand the company saves around 2-3 million Euro each year because of cheap energy prices thanks to the merit order effect of renewables.
But that doesn't make the headline.

These short interruptions to the German electric grid increased by 29 percent and the number of service failures increased 31 percent over a 3-year period, with about half of those failures leading to production stoppages causing damages ranging from ten thousand to hundreds of thousands of Euros. These power grid fluctuations in Germany are causing major damage to a number of industrial companies, who have responded by getting their own power generators and regulators to help minimize the risks. However, companies warn that they might be forced to leave if the government does not deal with the issues quickly.

We still have a very high grid quality (much better than the US grid for comparison) and those companies that really need perfect quality like the microchip industry did have systems like flywheels or battery backup since many years.

Btw, nobody said that changing a system comes without problems.

In the meantime, Germany’s neighbors, Poland and the Czech Republic, are taking action on Germany’s use of their power grid that Germany undertook without asking permission and without paying for its use. These countries are building a huge switch-off at their borders to block the import of green energy that is destabilizing their grids and causing potential blackouts in their countries. This action by German’s neighbors fragments the European electrical grid, turning Germany into an electrical island.

That#s because the connection between East Germany and West Germany is quite weak and only a few GW. That's for historical reasons and nothing new.

In reality Poland and Czeck republic do not like to transport and import wind energy from Germany which cause their own fossil power plants to lower production.

Nobody said that transission is without problems, but most things are greatly overblown. Many people want Germany see to fail, that#s the same people that predicted that 10% renewables is impossible, that 20% renewable is impossible and so on.
The same people that predicted that the lights will go out after we switch of 8 of our nuclear reactors and when this didn't happen they predicted huge imports from France, but in reality 2012 was our record export year for electricity and 2013 will set another record.

Sooner or later we will have a blackout (as we had in the past, those things just happen from time to time) and I'm sure that we will see thousands of journalists and experts blaming it on the renewables.

Ironically, to back-up the wind and solar energy, German utilities are using coal.

Why is it ironically? currently this is cheaper than gas, so we use it instead of gas.

The high use of renewable energy in eastern Germany driven by government green energy policies is causing instability to its own electric grid as well as to neighboring countries, resulting in industrial companies having to purchase generators and emergency back-up systems rather than face replacing equipment damaged during disruptions of service.

Little problems in reality. Nothing unexpected, nothing serious so far.

Electricity bills are also expected to go up by 10 percent this year. With residential electricity prices in Germany already about 3 times higher than prices in the United States and increasing further, it is no wonder that 800,000 German households can’t afford their electricity bills.

We have reports here that millions of US Americans can afford food.

I assume it's the same nonsense. People just like to read about other countries failing.

800,000 people is 1% of the population. there is always more than 1% of the population who can not keep their money together. This has nothing to do with price, but with the inability of those poeple to pay for essentials and ignore luxuries.

The R&D to develop those solar panels did not happen in Bangladesh. The subsidies for the panels and loans did not originate in Bangladesh. It was all developed on the back of an abundance of high EROEI fossil fuel energy in an advanced economy.

And this is why WE have to do it NOW.

This is why the US has to subsidize electric cars, or gas powered trucks or whatever sustainable things (not fracking), this is why the German solar subsidies have been good for the world.
without Germany paying a few billions through higher electricity rates those 1 million solar homes would not exist in Bangladesh.
But now they exist.

The Us has the option to bring new technologies to the market, for example electric cars. why not use 100 billion US$ to subsidize 10 million of those cars? That's small money compared to your military costs or to money given to banks, money avoided by companies like Apple doing their little tax tricks...

I'm sure that electric cars would be an economical option to the world if the first 10 million of them have been sold.

Just do it and don't talk about what is impossible (but isn't).

And if we had to rely on 7:1 solar EROEI from now on, that could spell real problems for our energy supply going forward.

It's more like 10:1 to 20:1 and improving.

Especially if the EOREI falls further once you factor in building backup power and/or storage. It might not be a big deal when the sun passes behind a cloud and the lights dim in a Bangladesh village. But is it a big deal if a factory churning out solar PV panels in Germany seizes up and experiences equipment damage from voltage fluctuations and brownouts in an unstable grid.

You are seeing problems that do not exist. we added 33GW of solar power without any need of new backup power or storage. This electricity just fits perfectly fine to our demand during summer.

you can add 2.000 GW of PV power to the worlds electricty grids without the need of any storage system.

get 30-40% of renewables into the grid and after that you can talk about storage problems, until then you just need a concept how to use your existing power plant fleet and make it more flexible and keeping their economy intact (you do not need to repeat the same failures as we did).

All those talk about storage needs is nonsense from layman. Until 30-40% wind+solar you need next to no storage, maybe some systems for short term grid stability if your rotating masses in thermal power plants are not available.

And btw, storage is nothing new. we used it to make nuclear power plant generation more flexible for decades.

Long term storage systems are needed in a grid with more than 90% wind+solar and it is a LONG way to this.

Not per capita. Per capita, US co2 emissions are at a 50 year low.

Now, per capita numbers are fine for you, but when comparing China to the US they are not?

You just pick the number that suits your needs.

Adjusted for the population, CO2 emissions per capita last year were the lowest since 1964, almost 50 years ago. According to Department of Energy forecasts, the decline in per capita CO2 emissions is expected to continue so consistently that within about 20 years, greenhouse gas emissions per person in the US will be below the level in 1949!

And what happens then, when you have replaced coal with gas and your emssions have been falling to levels the Eu is already?
What are the next steps?

In 20 years we don't need Americans emitting 10t CO2/ year, we need Americans emitting 3-4 t CO2 / year.

If if your CO2 future is so "bright", why don't you have any interst in making it into binding international low and particiapting in international negotiations about reducing CO2.

Let me guess: Nobody really believes it. I don't.

all this predictions are based on the assumtion that you enjoy super cheap gas from fracking for the next decades and it is based on the assumtion, that no methan is released from fracking.

there are people that are not so sure about it:

http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/e2-wir ... on-climate

I just took the first link from the search engine. I'm no expert on this and simply don't know if it is true, but you see that is very easy to provide links to study to support ANY argument.

As we observe Earth Day on April 22, we should celebrate the fact that we have “rolled back the carbon clock” by almost 50 years on a per capita basis in the US, and CO2 emissions per capita are expected to fall within the next 20 years to the lowest level in almost a century.

Energy fact of the day: US CO2 emissions per capita in 2012 were the lowest since 1964[/quote]

If you fall below the per capita level of the EU I will keep notice...

all your climate policy depends on the single bet on continuous supply of super cheap gas from fracking.

If you believe in this, why do you explore new expensive offshore oil? why don't you accept binding CO2 reduction laws? If you want China to reduced CO2 emissions, why are you opposing and sabotaging climate conferences?

Just doesn't sound logical to me. I do not believe you. (=the US)

[cephalotus]

---I'm certainly not going to travel to Germany to take anything from you...

Sure. Difficult to take away wind and solar power plants or lignite...

But didn't you just try to get something by force from Iraq?

(Oh sorry, I forgot, you spent 1 trillion US$ to bring democracy to the Iraqi people and destroy weapons of mass destruction. I assume this is why yo are so popular over there...)

[Graeme]

Thanks for your contribution here cephalotus. I'll have more to say later. In the meantime, I think that the US has to do a lot more to reduce it's emissions in spite of pending announcement from Obama. Some are worried that he will further delay the Keystone XL pipeline decision.

Electricity Emissions Around The World (Maps)

Electricity emissions are a function of two things: how much electricity is used and how carbon intensive that electricity is. Using data from 60 countries this post explains how our electricity emissions vary around the world.

As a rough guide, coal has a carbon intensity of about 1,000g CO2/kWh, oil is 800g CO2/kWh, natural gas is around 500g CO2/kWh, while nuclear, hydro, wind, and solar are all less than 50 g CO2/kWh. I’ve graphed them previously.

In India, Mongolia, and South Africa, the dark red coloring indicates electricity emissions of more than 900g CO2/kWh, due to coal’s dominance.


Now that we have data for the carbon intensity of electricity and how much people use in their homes, we can compare residential electricity emissions.

The largest footprints are from those countries that both use a lot of electricity and have quite carbon intensive electricity. Of the sixty or so countries we analysed, Saudi Arabia, the United States, and Australia had by far the largest emissions at more than 2,500 kg per person.

cleantechnica

[kublikhan]

I read:

"...The Energy Information Administration expects that coal will be used to produce 39.1 percent of the country’s total electricity generation in 2013 and 2014, up from 37.4 percent last year. This is due to rising natural gas prices...."

This is with just a little increase in gas prices.

We will have to wait and see what happens in the future.
.....

I already realised that you will always find something else to blame more.

*sigh*, still playing the blame game I see? I have no interest in this game and that was not the intent of my post. I was pointing out logistical issues that will limit the ability of the US to become the coal exporting king you seem to think it will become. The coal industry in the US is struggling right now. I think part of the problem we are having is you see everything through the lens of climate policy. I think, for the moment at least, that market concerns are a larger factor. Meaning that if US coal is expensive to mine and transport, it will lose market share to others who can mine and transport the coal more cheaply. Note that I am all for the US getting onboard with climate policy and am not happy it has not thus far. But even absent a global climate policy, other factors are at work restricting the US coal industry. You seem to have a twisted picture of the US into some kind of caricature where the US can only do harm. I would ask you to suspend this comical exageration and look at what is happening in reality.

The coal industry got another dose of bad news this week; with U.S. coal producers reporting a 31% drop in exports during the month of April. Ernie Thrasher, chief executive of XCoal, which is a U.S. coal trader, now believes that total U.S. exports of coal will fall by 10% to 15%. If exports continue to fall, the oversupply problem will continue to grow.

Adding additional pressures to U.S. producers is the higher cost associated with coal production in the U.S. versus other areas in the world. The average cost to produce one metric ton for U.S. producers runs between $135 and $145, versus just $110 a metric ton for Australia-based BHP. The benchmark price for coal is expected to fall to around $150 a metric ton in the next few weeks, which will put extreme pressure on U.S. coal producers which are paying close to that to produce the coal.

The impacts are already apparent. Virginia-based Alpha Natural Resources (ANR) recently said that it plans to shut down a mine located in West Virginia. Another U.S. producer, Arch Coal (ACI) plans to stop production at two of its mines located in Kentucky.

With falling coal prices, lower demand for coal in Asia, and cheaper coal in other parts of the world, the U.S. coal industry seems to be in serious trouble.

Coal industry's downward spiral continues

Now, per capita numbers are fine for you, but when comparing China to the US they are not?

You just pick the number that suits your needs.

They are a valid measurement in both cases. I am fully aware US per capita emissions are amoung the highest in the world and need to be lowered ASAP. Just because I want China to stop raising it's emissions does not mean I do not want the US emissions to fall even faster, I do. Just to reiterate, I want all nations to lower their co2 emissions, ESPECIALLY THE US. But I also want China, and the rest of the developing world to stop raising them. They are undoing all of the progress the developed nations are making lowering their emissions.

Where did you find that those interest rates are zero and is this relevant?

It was from the article below. I was just pointing out that renewables still need subsidies to compete with fossil fuels. This is not a major issue for me. Fossil fuels are a mature technology that got subsidies for decades. Renewables are an emergent tech and will naturally need more subsidies to remain competitive. Also, fossil fuels do harm to the environment that is not captured in their price so some subsidies to green tech seems in order. However your earlier post seemed to imply that green tech was ready to compete on a level playing field against fossil fuels. We are not quite there yet.

Zubair is the task team leader of the Rural Electrification and Renewable Energy Development project in Bangladesh, for which the World Bank approved a $130 million zero-interest International Development Association (IDA) loan in 2009 and another $172 million loan in 2011. An earlier IDA credit had launched the project in 2002.

Funds from IDA and other development partners are used to re-finance part of the microcredit extended to the households. Each system also gets a subsidy of $28 (down from the original $90 per system a decade ago). In addition to IDA support, the solar home systems program in Bangladesh has received financing from the World Bank-managed Carbon Finance Unit, the Global Partnership on Output-Based Aid, and several other donors including the Asian Development Bank, and the German agencies KfW and GiZ.

Electricity from Solar Panels Transforms Lives in Rural Bangladesh

Here's an english pdf of the Graciosa energy project:
Graciosa Project Overview

It sounds like a really interesting project. But 40% of the cost of the system is financied by subsidies :/ I was hoping the project would be able to stand on it's own. Still, it's nice to see projects like this moving forward.

the real problem is that new power plants are not interesting to investors, because electricity prices are way to low now and runtime hours are to short.
THIS is a real concern now.
...
That's true but this isn't a real problem. we just pay it. I will pay 50€ct/kWh electricity if I need to do so. I think this is still cheap enough.

You want Germany to have electricity rates that are 4-5 times higher than the rest of the world?

We still have a very high grid quality (much better than the US grid for comparison)

Thanks for this tidbit! Despite what you might think, I am not out to "get" Germany or China and am more interested in the facts. I want to see renewables succeed in Germany, work out all of the kinks, expand out the renewable market so it gets much cheaper, and hopefully implement a similiar renewable energy revolution everywhere else.

all your climate policy depends on the single bet on continuous supply of super cheap gas from fracking.

Have you been following my posts in the energy progress report thread? 80% of new power capacity installed in the US last quarter was renewable sources of energy, with 0 net additions of coal, oil, and nuclear. For the month of March, 100% of all power additions were solar. Now that was probably just an unusually good quarter for renewables, but last year renewables made up 50% of additions to the power grid.

The report is called the “Energy Infrastructure Update” and it shows that renewable energy sources (biomass, geothermal, solar, water, wind) have accounted for 82% of all new domestic electrical generating capacity installed for the first quarter of 2013. The total amount of the combined renewables came in at 1,546 MW.

The big winner in renewables for the month of March was solar, which produced 100% of the new electrical generation capacity, with 7 new units with a combined capacity of 44 MW.

It is clear that renewable energy sources continue to dominate the new electrical generating capacity being brought on-line in the United States. It seems like with every one of these reports it becomes clearer that coal is slowly fading away and a cleaner future is on its way with renewables.

Solar = 100% Of New Power Capacity In March, Renewables = 82% In Q1

Germany’s dash for coal continues apace. Following on the opening of two new coal power stations in 2012, six more are due to open this year, with a combined capacity of 5800MW, enough to provide 7% of Germany’s electricity needs. In addition, 27 gas fired stations are due on line, which should contribute a further 17% of Germany’s total electricity generation.

Germany To Open Six More Coal Power Stations In 2013

I get that you don't like fracking and hate the high per capita co2 emissions in the US. But the picture is more complicated than Germany good, US bad. I am not a big fan of nuclear, but IMHO the premature mothballing of the German nuclear fleet is a big mistake. The expensive reactors were already built and running, might as well use them until the end of their life. That would give you more time to greatly expand out your renewables without having to add more fossil fueled generation. At the same time, you have to understand that the US IS making progress on the green energy front, despite it's reluctance to sign on to climate policies. We are closing coal plants like mad, and replacing them with cleaner gas and renewables. IMHO, your focus on the US's refusal to sign onto new climate policy is blinding you to actual progress the US is making.

[cephalotus]

The coal industry in the US is struggling right now. I think part of the problem we are having is you see everything through the lens of climate policy.

It's athread about climate, isn't it. Of course there are different factors.

From the climate point of view, keeping the (US) coal in the ground is not only desirable, but necessary. Also Germany and China, Poland, Australia, etc... have to keep their coal in the ground.

We also have to keep shale gas, shale oil, deep sea oil and tar sands in the ground, because it seams very unrealistic that we will leave the super cheap oil and gas from Saudi Arabia or Russia in the ground instead.

We are able to burn only a quite small part of our fossil fuels if we would take climate change serious.

Germany also does not act this way, so far no country does and this is the reason why I believe that any climate negotitons based on CO2 reduction are pointless, as long as we do not agree on keeping most of our resurces in the ground.

If the world would act wise it would buy the cheap and "less worse" stuff like natural gas and keep the rest in the ground, but for acting in such a manner we would need binding international laws, no country will do this on their own, as long as theer is economical benefit in burning your own stuff.

They are a valid measurement in both cases. I am fully aware US per capita emissions are amoung the highest in the world and need to be lowered ASAP.

Ok. To me you sounded like telling me that you are the ultimate climate saver in the world...

Just because I want China to stop raising it's emissions does not mean I do not want the US emissions to fall even faster, I do. Just to reiterate, I want all nations to lower their co2 emissions, ESPECIALLY THE US.

We had the chance with the Kyoto protocol which the US refused to sign. We had another chance in Kopenhagen, which US and China sabotaged together.
Today there is no chance left for an international climate protocol and imho it's already to late anyway.

I also believe that neither the Democrats nor the Republican party in the US will sign anything and without the US an international climate protocol is as useless as it is without China, too. Your population does not believe in climate change.
China would sign an international climate protocol if the US would do so, I'm quite sure on that...
So from my point of view it's mainly the US why Kyoto and Kopenhagen failed.

I can not see any signs for new negotiations.

But I also want China, and the rest of the developing world to stop raising them. They are undoing all of the progress the developed nations are making lowering their emissions.

Half of China is yet undeveloped and like a 3rd world country. They deserve the right to develop this, so any negotaions have to take that into account.
This does not mean that they don't have to do anything about their coal power plants.

But I assume they will do this anyway, because air quality has become really bad...

I was just pointing out that renewables still need subsidies to compete with fossil fuels.

I disagree. Today we have 5-10 times more direct subsidies on fossil fuels than on renewable fuels. I'm only counting direct subsidies, not external costs.

Renewables are an emergent tech and will naturally need more subsidies to remain competitive.

I agree and it#s not just wind + solar, but also homes that use much less energy for heating, electric cars, public transport, hydrogen planes, long distance high speed trains (something where China is very good, their trains are competitive to air travel), redcing methane emissions from oil, coal and gas exploring, technologies to kill the huge underground fires in coal mines, reforest affords, a programm to grow topsoil, not lose it (a carbon storage "technology"), a ethical and environmental friendly approach on biofules and much more...
I'm also not generally anti nuclear, so for those that think this is a solution they should develop better nukes and waste management systems or maybe try fusion.

there is room for every country to be a leader in certain technologies...

Also, fossil fuels do harm to the environment that is not captured in their price so some subsidies to green tech seems in order. However your earlier post seemed to imply that green tech was ready to compete on a level playing field against fossil fuels. We are not quite there yet.

I think that renewable are higly underestimated.

I just had a look at the actual IEA climate report and they expect something around 230GW of PV electricity in 2020.
We now have 100GW PV electricity and we added 30GW in 2011 and 30GW in 2012. There is production capacity for 60GW/a already available.
So why does the IEA believe that PV installations will shrink significantly in the next years, when it has become much cheaper in the last years, when China, Japan and others plan to install huge amounts of it.

I think that there is an agenda to talk them small.

When cancellor Merkel was enviromental minister during the Kohl era in Germany she told the people that Germany will never be able to have more than 4% renewables in the electricitry mix, because it is technically not possible (that's around the amount of water power that we have. Those number was given to her by the electric companies).
They built the GROWIAN wind power plant many years ago (the by far largest wind turbine at ist time), just to "proof" that wind energy does not work.

During the same time we tried thorium reactors, fast plutonium breeders and several other nuclear experiments and every single one failed badly.

We now have 33GW of pv electricity. The greenest people have not been able to imagine this kind of success. Yes it's a bit costly and imho it would have been wise to cut feed in tariffs faster, but those costs will go away in 15-18 years. Other countries do not need to buy the "early costs", PV is quite cheap now.

When you reach German installation costs you can have solar power for 7-8USct/kWh.

Do you think that this is to expensive? I assume that you will be able to easily install 100-200GW in the US and it will help the grid with peak load in the South instead of causing problems. You do not need any storage for the first 5-10% of solar power, depending on the load profile.

It sounds like a really interesting project. But 40% of the cost of the system is financied by subsidies :/

where do you read this?

Afaik it does not get nor need any subsidies, only the testing of the system/battery was subsidized. Electricity prices on Graciosa ar 30€ct/kWh now with Diesel generators.

(worldwide installed Diesel powered capacity is around 160GW, that's a huge market)

Btw, I forgot, that they plan to use a combined NaS / Li-Ion battery instead of pure NaS.

I was hoping the project would be able to stand on it's own. Still, it's nice to see projects like this moving forward.

They will. You need the proof that it can be done on first demonstration projects and after it has been proofed banks are willing to finance them.
Often subsidies are only needed because banks do not finance new technologies or ask for very high interest rates.

This is not different to, lets say, new nuclear reactors.

You want Germany to have electricity rates that are 4-5 times higher than the rest of the world?

I don't want it but I don't oppose it.

We traditionally have high houshold tariffs. That#s only to a small part because of renewables, we also have high taxes on electricity.
It's our concept to tax energy consumption instead of human work. (so a significant amount of the money for electricity goes into our retirement fonds for example)

Germany could reduce household tariffs on electricity to half tomorrow if they just would remove several taxes on it, but it is our idea that high energy prices are not bad, because low prices just lead to waste.

We have a 2 person household and we consume less than 2.000kWh/year. This includes my large terrarium which consumes around 700-800kWh/a.
i do have everything that I need, electric cooking, washing machine, large TV, two Notebooks, LED lights everywhere, fridge, freezer, two electric bikes...

If I would need 10.000kWh/a I would be more concerned about electricity rates, but at my consumption this amount of money is quite irrelevant.

I accept that some(!) parts of the industry are more price sensitive and need to hav lower rates, so housholds have to pay a bigger share. But also small business do not have problems with electricity prices. You may read this in the newspapaer, but it simply is not true for 99% of them. Almost every shop here has its light tunr on at full power during the entire night, almost no company is intersted in energy efficiency and most CEOS don't even know about their rates or don't care. Electricity often makes less of 1% of the overall costs, they are way more concerned about many other things like wages, product margins, etc...

You have to understand the newspaper stories and reality are two very different things. My colleagues have the energy data of thousands of small to medium (and some large) German companies available, they are talking to CEOS about energy costs and energy efficiency...

Yes, there are some exceptions like bakeries,that start to care about energy costs, but they are few.

I hevaily doubt that a country needs cheap energy prices to prosper. Traditionally the US had MUCH lower energy costs than Germany and what's the difference?
You have larger cars and larger fridges, but I have no desire for this.
Your companies are not more competitive than ours and your wealth/happiness/living quality standard is not significantly different from ours.
So you pay half the price and consume twice as much, but what is your benefit of it?

If I would have the desire to buy a car that runs 250km/h I would just do so and I would also be able to pay for the gasoline, no matter if it is 1,50€/liter or 2,50€/liter. I also would be able to drive that 250km/h, so at least their would be some benefit.
But I see little reason to do so.
I commute by bike, because I think that this is much more desirable than sitting in a fucking car every morning. I drive mostly through a park, breath fresh air, get the blood circulation before sitting a day on my desk. Very good! I wouldn't drive a car to work if it would be free.
I even bike trough rain, snow, ice, heat waves, because it is joyful.
It is joyful to feel the weather and this is why I enjoy living at 18°C in winter and 25°c in summer and not vice versa. I don't remember when I have been ill the last time...

On the other hand you have countries like Qatar where the want to ski in the desert, cool the beach, cool their rooms down to 15°C (to get ill), use desalinated water to spray it around like mad in the desert, just because energy is free.
They do not even switch of the motors of their cars. I don't understand this. Standing next to a running car nd talking is not so joyful.

Others use cheap energy to consume. taking a flight to go shooping for an afetrnoon in London is not so uncommon (because Kerosine is cheap and airplanes are subsidized). But I do not see that this shpooing trips makes those people happier, those (few) that i know are shopaholics and not really happy.

I alos have my "weak parts", i.e. I like travelling and this often includes air flights, too. That's catastrophic to the climate and I know this.
I would happily pay 2-3 times more money for the flights if the would be made with hydrogen or other CO2 neutral technology.
Maybe I would make less trips than (I do not have unlimited money, of course), but nothing is wrong with having less flights. It's just perverse that people expect the "right" to have 3-4 flights each year.

Sure, a 90-100% CO2 free energy system in Germany would make energy more expensive in the short term, but I'm very happy to pay it.
This may be an uncommen concept to many, but it's how I think about it.

that#s why I pay higher electricity rates for 100% renewables and if I would heat my home with gas (I use waste heat from a gas power plant now), I would pay more for biogas or syn. gas (both can be bought already over here), because I do not only want to talk.

If I would build a new home (still an option) it would be a solar home, using the technical maximum amount of solar energy for electricity, hot water, heating and a future electric car, there is absolutely no question about it and it will not cost more than the average house.

Have you been following my posts in the energy progress report thread? 80% of new power capacity installed in the US last quarter was renewable sources of energy, with 0 net additions of coal, oil, and nuclear. For the month of March, 100% of all power additions were solar. Now that was probably just an unusually good quarter for renewables, but last year renewables made up 50% of additions to the power grid.

That's positive and shows how far renewable have already come (tell this to those that we need decades of R&D until renewables are an "option").

Do you have a link to your government and it's CO2 targets for the coming decades and maybe a plan how to achieve this? Is there any official document about CO2 reduction in the US?

It seems like with every one of these reports it becomes clearer that coal is slowly fading away and a cleaner future is on its way with renewables.

Solar = 100% Of New Power Capacity In March, Renewables = 82% In Q1
[/quote]

It's a step at the right direction, but it's only a step among many.

In the end every CO2 molecule counts, so you have to look at the entire picture.

Germany’s dash for coal continues apace. Following on the opening of two new coal power stations in 2012, six more are due to open this year, with a combined capacity of 5800MW, enough to provide 7% of Germany’s electricity needs. In addition, 27 gas fired stations are due on line, which should contribute a further 17% of Germany’s total electricity generation.

Germany To Open Six More Coal Power Stations In 2013[/quote]

We need backup capacity when the last nuclear reactors are switched of. Even in a 40% wind+solar secanrio there are days when you need almost 100% of fossil fuels.

It's cheaper and more economical and ecological than using storage capacity, at least at wuite "low" rates of renewables.

the problem with German power plants is the very low electricity price on the spot market. all reneables are marketed with zero costs (this is the EEG systems) and this is a huge and startegic failure in the market design. Nobody expected renewables, especially solar to reach those capacities so soon, they didn't expect 30GW until 2030 and we had it in 2012.
Now gas power plants have to shut down, even our best ones with 60% efficiency, we add more coal and keep coal power plants running and are exporting this eelctricity very cheap, which causes gas power plants to switch off in neigbhouring countries.

THIS is the huge mistake Germany makes now and you have to avoid it.

If you have a similar share of solar capacity your market prices will fall below zero and this is dramatic so you need a different market design.

If we will not solve this problem of market price integration very soon we will have a catastrophic(!) failure.

This has nothing to do with technological problems, it has nothing to do with high consumer prices, but is a problem of very low to negative market prices, caused by huge amounts of renewables with a market cost of zero leading to the the destruction of the economy of any gas power plant and pumped hydro storage system which are essential for the grid (and CO2 targets), but are already shutting down.

Either we have a solution within the next 2 years or you will see a collapse of the German (and therfore European) electricity market.
France already also has huge problems, they are not able to sell their surplus nuclear capacity and have problems in the winter because the lack capacity then.
Gas power plants in the Netherlands have to shut down, because Germany is exporting huge amounts of electricity at super low prices, just to keep the old coal and nuclear reactors running....

I get that you don't like fracking

I see it as ADDITIONAL CO2 in the long end.

I am not a big fan of nuclear, but IMHO the premature mothballing of the German nuclear fleet is a big mistake.

Germany decided to siwthc them of as early as 2000 when the green party was part of the government.

Lobbyist tried to get that law back and succeded in 2010 and then came Fukushima.

For Merkel this was an eye opener that Tschernobly was not an avoidable accident by some drunk Russian technics and substandard Russian technology, but that any reactor of that kind will have problems if you can not keep the electricity running.
for example there is Byblis B in Germany. It takes a small team of terrorist to hit it on three relevant points and after that a meltdown would be impossible to stop.
we already had several significant failures, but have been just lucky. The Swiss had a reactor meltdown some decades ago.

We are very densily populated, if one of our nukes goes up we have a huge problem and it would cost us more than switching the entire economy to renewables.

There had been studies from insurance companies and they wanted 6 trillion(!) Euro to cover all German nuclear reactors. You could finance a global insurance system for all 440 nuclear reactors, but for Germany 6 trillion Euro is far from achievable.

The US is a large country and many areas are not very populated, so your benefit vs. risk analysis my be different.

We still have the waste problem. No solution has been found during 60 years, but billions of Euro have been wasted for nothing.

The expensive reactors were already built and running, might as well use them until the end of their life. That would give you more time to greatly expand out your renewables without having to add more fossil fueled generation.

We decided not to do. Keep in mind that we already reached the Kyoto targets.

IMHO, your focus on the US's refusal to sign onto new climate policy is blinding you to actual progress the US is making.

We both agree that we need all relevnat countries sitting on the table to agree on a climate policy. Those countries ahve to agree not only on CO2 caps on EVERY nation, but also have to agree which (amount) of fossil fuels are allowed to be used and which are not.

I assume that we both agree that without any binding global wide climate targets it simply does not matter if the US emits 18 or 19t CO2/ person or if germany emits 10 or 11t/person.
It doesn't matter if we use coal or not.
No country is able to stop climate change, climate change can only be stopped if we get >98% of all CO2 emitents on the table.

All eyes are look at US and China. The US refused Kyoto (China was not that relevant at that time), China and the Us sabotaged Kopenhagen, China and US heavily(!) opposed the EU law on carbon tax for flights (that would have been quite low, btw)

Please understand the German point of view. If you tell use that we should keep out coal in the ground to save the climate we don't care.

come to the table and than we talk.

Otherwise we are now getting prepared for a +4K world. It's the only intelligent thing that we could do now.

If you think that climate change is a threat, you have to persuade your fellow US citizens first to put it on your countries political agenda...

[kublikhan]

I disagree. Today we have 5-10 times more direct subsidies on fossil fuels than on renewable fuels. I'm only counting direct subsidies, not external costs.

Fossil fuel subsidies on a per MWh basis are much lower than renewables. But again, renewables are nascent technologies. When compared to nascent fossil fuel technologies such as refined coal or CSS, renewables are competitive even when looking at subsidies on a per MWh basis.

Critics argue that renewable energy technologies cannot compete on price with fossil fuels without public subsidies. It’s true to date that renewables’ return per dollar of federal assistance remains higher than for fossil fuels. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), federal subsidies for conventional coal generated electricity production in 2007 equaled $0.44/MWh (megawatt-hour). The equivalent figure for wind was $23.37 and for solar, $24.34 per MWh.

But these critics miss the mark. Commercial scale federal subsidies for renewables are less than twenty years old, dating to production tax credits enacted under the Energy Policy Act of 1992 to bolster national energy security in the aftermath of the first Gulf War. Furthermore, production tax credits for renewable energy have been subject to on again, off again congressional approval. This contrasts with fossil fuel subsidies, recipients of largely continuous and predictable subsidies since 1917.

Nor are the costs of subsidies for renewables out of line with other emerging and evolving clean energy technologies. For example, federal subsidies for refined coal technology that removes moisture and certain pollutants from sub-bituminous and lignite in 2007 equaled $29.81/MWh. If refined coal and FutureGen are any indication, yet untested clean-coal carbon sequestration will require vast federal expenditures on a scale probably surpassing what has been directed to wind and solar.

The Federal Energy Subsidy Scorecard: How Renewables Stack Up

where do you read this?

Afaik it does not get nor need any subsidies, only the testing of the system/battery was subsidized. Electricity prices on Graciosa ar 30€ct/kWh now with Diesel generators.

From the PDF, on the page talking about the Financing structure & contraltual relationships(page 5). 30% of the project cost was financed, 30% was equity, and the remaining 40% was subsidies.

Final structure of financing is dependent on upcoming discussions with NGO`s to provide refundable subsidies and/or non-refundable subsidies for the Bequia project.

The Government will also seek international financial funding for feasibility and planning studies as well as investments in the form of grants or soft-loans to raise the economic viability and lower financial risks to support private power operators to replace diesel fuel with RES.

Switching Off the Generator

Half of China is yet undeveloped and like a 3rd world country. They deserve the right to develop this, so any negotaions have to take that into account.

If you had your way, what would your energy policy be for China? I doubt they could afford jacking up the electricity rates 3-4 times like in Germany. And they are already building out their renewables at an incredible pace but it is still not enough to curb coal growth. Do you think it is feasible for all of China to raise it's standard of living to say, the EU level without substantial co2 emission increases?

Do you have a link to your government and it's CO2 targets for the coming decades and maybe a plan how to achieve this? Is there any official document about CO2 reduction in the US?

Obama has a "goal" of achieving the following targets:

Sitting President Barack Obama committed during the December 2009 Copenhagen Climate Change Summit that the United States would reduce carbon dioxide emissions in the range of 17% below 2005 levels by 2020, 42% below 2005 levels by 2030, and 83% below 2005 levels by 2050.

Climate change policy of the United States

A few domestic climate policy bills were introduced in congress but as far as I know, none of them actually passed both houses of congress. I guess the closest thing we have then is the changes made to the Clean Air Act. Green House Gases are now classified as a pollutant and thus subject to EPA regulation:

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) began regulating greenhouse gases (GHGs) under the Clean Air Act (“CAA” or “Act”) from mobile and stationary sources of air pollution for the first time on January 2, 2011.

Because the LDV Rule and the application of the PSD program to GHGs took effect only recently, it is too soon to assess by how much they have reduced actual GHG emissions and at what cost. Because EPA’s authority to regulate GHG emissions has such significant implications for the economy, the environment, and our society at large, it is a topic of interest to a broad range of organizations including Congress, the courts, the states, environmental organizations, and the regulated industry. All of these entities have had a direct hand in shaping the laws, regulations, and policies concerning GHGs into what they are today and will likely continue to do so in the future.

Regulation of greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act