Germany “making progress in investing in clean energy” is the understatement of the milennium. Without the cash injection brought about by the German feed-in tariffs wind and solar still would be completely uncompetitive instead of (in many circumstances) cheaper than fossil and nuclear.
And, then, well, we had 16 years of a conservative government trying their darnest to fuck up the transition.
And, then, well, we had 16 years of a conservative government trying their darnest to fuck up the transition.
That is not true. Read up on what actually happened. The EEG was thought up by Hermann Scheer and Hans-Josef Fell. SPD and Grüne. The EEG failed miserably, when the “AufglMechV” came in to effect and pulled fossile fuel prices up like crazy. Because that meant the “Merit-Order-Effect” came in to play, meaning the falling use of fossile fuels ment that the EEG-Umlage spiked like crazy. The issue with that was that the power net back then was a lot more fragile than it is now (and it still is fragile), meaning fossile fuels provided “Grundlast” and between 2010 and 2013 the EEG was not enough. That on the other hand meant that the projections for the manufacturers of wind turbines looked very bleak and most of them folded and gave up, before they had massive losses. The fact that the European Union Emissions Trading System also “backfired” due to the crash in 2008 and took until 2017 to actually get on track made things even worse, behause that meant that instead of prices for burning fossile fuels getting higher - they got lower and renewables got more expensive.
The issue stays with the EEG, because it had a fatal and fundamental design flaw that made acceptance in the general public extremely hard: The basic main part of the EEG had to be shouldered by the “normal” population. And these were already estimated in 2010 at over 2200 billion euros in additional costs. Everything that happened every since 2013 didn’t make that situation any better.
The only thing that the black-yellow coalition really screwed up completely was the extension of the exemptions from the EEG. But by that point, things already were in Motion anyway. The whole thing has been a clusterfuck of monumental proportions, where so many things have gone wrong at so many corners, so many people and so many decisions are to blame, to simply break it down to one government is WAY too simplistic and only makes things worse - and actually helps the AfD and their stupid rethorics
The only thing that the black-yellow coalition really screwed up completely was the extension of the exemptions from the EEG.
And allowing Bavaria to de facto outlaw wind energy. And not building nearly enough transportation capacity, especially north-south. Killing the domestic solar industry (though that’s more of a “we don’t need to jobs” issue, China is producing plenty of panels). Not doing nearly enough on the consumption side, *broadly gestures at the state of rail infrastructure*. Allowing coal plants to operate way longer than necessary. The list is quite long indeed, following the general scheme of “let’s listen to BMW and huff truck exhaust instead of listening to MunichRe telling us about god’s next great flood and them being unable to back the damages”.
The AusglMechV came 10 years after the EEG was passed, and yes legislation often needs adjustment it just so happened that it was passed by Red-Green and adjusted by Black-Yellow because that’s who was in government when it was done.
What I was specifically talking about was the EEG pushing enough money into the industry to get it up and running, bringing down the price in terms of Euro/MW drastically. It’s no coincidence that what 15 years or so into the EEG you saw windmills sprouting in countries without comparable laws: They had become price-competitive.
The basic main part of the EEG had to be shouldered by the “normal” population.
Electricity being expensive for the consumer was part of the plan to induce demand for more efficient fridges etc. Yeah the Greens aren’t a particularly left party they don’t care about chips falling where they happen to fall. A PDS/Green government wouldn’t have used market regulation but direct state action and spent probably about as much, just from more equitable sources.
Germany “making progress in investing in clean energy” is the understatement of the milennium. Without the cash injection brought about by the German feed-in tariffs wind and solar still would be completely uncompetitive instead of (in many circumstances) cheaper than fossil and nuclear.
And, then, well, we had 16 years of a conservative government trying their darnest to fuck up the transition.
That is not true. Read up on what actually happened. The EEG was thought up by Hermann Scheer and Hans-Josef Fell. SPD and Grüne. The EEG failed miserably, when the “AufglMechV” came in to effect and pulled fossile fuel prices up like crazy. Because that meant the “Merit-Order-Effect” came in to play, meaning the falling use of fossile fuels ment that the EEG-Umlage spiked like crazy. The issue with that was that the power net back then was a lot more fragile than it is now (and it still is fragile), meaning fossile fuels provided “Grundlast” and between 2010 and 2013 the EEG was not enough. That on the other hand meant that the projections for the manufacturers of wind turbines looked very bleak and most of them folded and gave up, before they had massive losses. The fact that the European Union Emissions Trading System also “backfired” due to the crash in 2008 and took until 2017 to actually get on track made things even worse, behause that meant that instead of prices for burning fossile fuels getting higher - they got lower and renewables got more expensive.
The issue stays with the EEG, because it had a fatal and fundamental design flaw that made acceptance in the general public extremely hard: The basic main part of the EEG had to be shouldered by the “normal” population. And these were already estimated in 2010 at over 2200 billion euros in additional costs. Everything that happened every since 2013 didn’t make that situation any better. The only thing that the black-yellow coalition really screwed up completely was the extension of the exemptions from the EEG. But by that point, things already were in Motion anyway. The whole thing has been a clusterfuck of monumental proportions, where so many things have gone wrong at so many corners, so many people and so many decisions are to blame, to simply break it down to one government is WAY too simplistic and only makes things worse - and actually helps the AfD and their stupid rethorics
And allowing Bavaria to de facto outlaw wind energy. And not building nearly enough transportation capacity, especially north-south. Killing the domestic solar industry (though that’s more of a “we don’t need to jobs” issue, China is producing plenty of panels). Not doing nearly enough on the consumption side, *broadly gestures at the state of rail infrastructure*. Allowing coal plants to operate way longer than necessary. The list is quite long indeed, following the general scheme of “let’s listen to BMW and huff truck exhaust instead of listening to MunichRe telling us about god’s next great flood and them being unable to back the damages”.
The AusglMechV came 10 years after the EEG was passed, and yes legislation often needs adjustment it just so happened that it was passed by Red-Green and adjusted by Black-Yellow because that’s who was in government when it was done.
What I was specifically talking about was the EEG pushing enough money into the industry to get it up and running, bringing down the price in terms of Euro/MW drastically. It’s no coincidence that what 15 years or so into the EEG you saw windmills sprouting in countries without comparable laws: They had become price-competitive.
Electricity being expensive for the consumer was part of the plan to induce demand for more efficient fridges etc. Yeah the Greens aren’t a particularly left party they don’t care about chips falling where they happen to fall. A PDS/Green government wouldn’t have used market regulation but direct state action and spent probably about as much, just from more equitable sources.