Green German gov battles to keep fossil powerplants running

[FarCenter]

The German government is engaged in increasingly heated negotiations with energy companies in an effort to stop them closing carbon-emitting power plants which have been rendered unprofitable by the national renewables policies.

Last week power giant RWE grumbled that many of its coal and gas power stations "are no longer profitable to operate", and said it would be closing some of them down. Its rival E.ON also said that it had plants "working for nothing", and announced plant shutdowns.

The problem for the fossil-fuel powerplants is the rise of renewables, particularly in Germany, and the fact that government policies mean that whenever a renewable plant generates any power it will take priority on the grid. This means that fossil plants get to sell less electricity, and also that their costs rise due to being turned on and off all the time.

Unfortunately German renewables still generate just 25 per cent of the country's electricity requirement over time, and worse, they aren't controllable: they produce power when the wind blows and the sun shines, not when the grid needs it. There is still no way to store electricity on the scales demanded by a major national grid, so the fossil powerplants are still completely essential if Germany is to keep its lights on.

But the government's renewable policies have meant that you can't make a profit running a fossil powerplant, and left to themselves the energy firms would now like to close so many plants as to lead to power cuts in southern Germany (where solar installations are especially widespread).

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/20/german_gov_desperate_to_keep_coal_and_gas_powerplants_running/

[JRLeft]

1. SMH, this planet is finished. capitalists just cannot help themselves. They won't be he most likely

so the figure why should I care? Disgusting.

[FarCenter]

2. The German voter will not be happy without electricity when the wind doesn't blow at night.