Germany thinks big as it taps into the sun

[jpak]

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/germany-thinks-big-as-it-taps-into-the-sun/2007/08/10/1186530618710.html

A VAST Soviet military training base located under the often sullen grey skies of former communist East Germany is an unlikely new hub for the world's burgeoning solar energy industry.

Part of the 28,000-hectare Lieberose training ground is to be transformed into what will be the world's biggest solar plant. Once open in 2009, it will help propel the country to the forefront of the international sun-power revolution.

Germany was now home to the largest concentration of solar manufacturing plants anywhere in the world, said the chief of the German Solar Industry Association, Carsten Kornig, this week.

In the long-term a third of the country's energy for heating and a quarter of the generation of electricity would be produced from solar plants sited near consumers, he said.

<more>

[Hardrada]

1. Hoch Deutschland! Hoch die Sonne!!

[NNadir]

2. Wow, that's some pretty expensive energy, even ignoring capacity utilization.

The new sun-power plant, which will cost between €160 million and €180 million and be built by Solar Projekt, will have a capacity of up to 50 megawatts. Hmmmm...

Oh wait, this is a "world's largest manufacturing plant."

There are some real gems in this article, like this one:

The country is also now in the process of phasing out nuclear energy, a push led by the former Social Democrat-Green party coalition. Although solar power generates just 3 per cent of the country's total energy, the Government plans to raise the renewable energy sector's overall contribution to the energy mix from 13 per cent to 27 per cent by 2020.

It's pretty amazing that the German's plan to phase out nuclear power - which provides more than 30% of of Germany's electricity and plan to "replace" it with 13% "percent" to 27 "percent."

It would seem that Germany couldn't care less about dangerous fossil fuels.

Probably they will fail, just as they have failed for the last 20 years of big talk even to reach the 13% figure for renewable energy. Similar renewable predictions dating back three decades have proved to be equally deluded. But even if they <em>succeed</em> at reaching the highest of their fuzzy figures, it's easy to see why Gerhard Schroeder became a fossil fuel executive, at more than 300,000 euros per year, after engineering the German nuclear phase out. He made a "can't lose" proposition for dangerous fossil fuel companies.

No wonder they're building so many coal plants.

[razzleberry]

7. Sweden phased-out nuclear power in 2000

IIRC, Sweden , in 1980, voted to eliminate nuclear power
by the year 2000.

I have confidence that Germany
will do something similiar.

[NickB79]

10. I don't know whether you were being sarcastic or not

But fully HALF of Sweden's power is supplied by nuclear reactors.

[wordpix]

12. are you working for the nuke industry or what, nnadir?

[phantom power]

15. Are you working for the solar industry?

[wordpix]

25. no but why don't you look at Germany's rooftops to learn about a progam that works?

[phantom power]

28. I'll make you a deal..

I'll go google up some photos of PV panels in Germany, if you break out a calculator and compare the Joules of energy produced by Germany's PV panels each year to the Joules of energy they're going to get each year from the 26 shiny new coal plants that they are going to build because they prefer dumping CO2 into the atmosphere to splitting atoms.

[wordpix]

27. Meet Nnadir, Geo. Bush's man against renewable resource energy

[Bitwit1234]

3. At least a lot of countries are checking alternative energy

but not this country. The big oil and coal companies won't let them.

[OKIsItJustMe]

4. Crazy Europeans...

They seem determined to build solar plants rather instead of saying, "It's impossible."
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,2681625,00.html
http://www.dw-world.de/image/0,,2373676_1,00.jpg

Oh, if only they knew as much as some of the geniuses on this board! :sarcasm:

[Dogmudgeon]

5. We pro-nuclearists aren't geniuses at all

It's just that instead of taking the word of corporations, "activists", and peer pressure, we ask questions. We look stuff up. When we have to, we do a little math. And we don't accept "everybody says so", especially when "everybody" is a clique of musicians and actors.

Asking questions is NOT genius. It is being awake.

--p!

[bvar22]

8. Gosh, I didn't know Germany was exclusively populated by

"a clique of musicians and actors."

Who woulda thought that "a clique of musicians and actors" could design and build Mercedes, Porche, or the ME262?
:shrug:

[Dogmudgeon]

9. So who said that?

There's Germany.

There's the cliques of musicians and actors.

There's people who go along with the peer crowd, corporations, and the press.

That's a number of different groups which also overlap, albeit imperfectly.

How could anyone miss the distinction?

Oh, yes. That thing about being awake.

--p!

[wordpix]

14. you look stuff up? How about the radioactivity of nuke waste & no one wants it? What's your

genius solution to that, and to securing each nuke plant from air, land and sea attacks?

Geniuses is right. :sarcasm:

[phantom power]

16. Say, you sound like you have an anser to my riddle.

Which you can read here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=107889&mesg_id=107936

[Dogmudgeon]

21. Do anti-nuclearists read AT ALL?

Wordpix, I've been posting material here in support of nuclear energy for three years.

Recently, I have been posting more.

MOST of my posts deal with the hazards and risks of nuclear and other forms of energy.

MOST OF THEM.

Probably about fifty in the last six months alone.

I have been repeating material from old posts about twice a week, because ranting, emotionalizing partisans can't be bothered to READ.

In particular, you have made two immoderately hot-headed snarky posts because I stated that we pro-nuclearists "look stuff up". My response seems to have set you off; I don't know, maybe you don't take well to people who think thoughts that you don't.

While you were doing that, you neglected to look ANYTHING up.

The Anti-Nuclear Kool Kidz Klub has got to be the most brain-dead faction of the Left. They can't do math, can't look stuff up, have no manners, they misrepresent people, gossip behind peoples' backs, put words in our mouths, argue more illogically than Freepers and accuse every argument of being a "strawman", play the "I know you are but what am I?" game, and erupt into anger nearly immediately. But when a pro-nuclearist replies in kind, they cry "foul!"

There actually ARE anti-nuclearists who can make a good case. But they aren't part of the club, the Movement, and they seldom style themselves as "activists" when they're merely web warriors.

On the other hand, there are no pro-nuclearists who oppose other forms of energy generation. Interesting.

If nuclear energy was so bad, you'd think there would be plenty of energy policy wonks with numbers and statistics and data to make sure the world knew. But the reality is the opposite -- the anti-nuclear movement has nothing to back it up. The only unique, real-world problems with nuclear energy are things the movement people don't even acknowlege, probably because they don't read. (Al Gore, who does not oppose nuclear energy, discusses them, but I have never seen an anti bring them up. Ever. Even when quoting Al to try to convince us he's "on their side".) The few "studies" that do exist to "prove" that nuclear energy is bad are from un-peer-reviewed sources, scientific institutes that exist only as a post office box in an office building in Brussels or Lyon, and well-disrespected journal mills. I have been over this several times; so have most of the other pro-nuclearists here.

So put the snarky emoticons away, and learn how to look things up before spewing uninformed outrage.

--p!

[wordpix]

26. and who are YOU working for? There was a reason no new nukes were built since the 70's in the US--

look THAT up

[Dogmudgeon]

29. When you can't make the case, lie about your opponent

"and who are YOU working for?"

Not who, but what. I'm working against ignorance.

And tell me, why do so many antis say this? It's like saying that everybody is a prostitute except YOU. If that isn't the signature attitude of the elite young morality police, I don't know what is.

"There was a reason no new nukes were built since the 70's in the US-- look THAT up"

I wrote at least two substantial posts on this topic already:

Dead accurate
Once Upon A Time: Plenty of oil, destruction of demand

You have misrepresented me a few times now, and are incensed that I've called you on it. Do you want to discuss nuclear energy, or continue to rant irrationally at me?

--p!

[wordpix]

36. start reading & stop touting the nuke industry's talking points

http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_energy/nuclear_safety/unlearned-lessons-from.html

Unlearned Lessons from Year-plus Reactor Outages

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) seems to be following the script of the movie Groundhog Day, reliving the same bad event again and again. This event—an outage at a nuclear power plant that lasts more than a year—has happened 51 times at 41 different reactors around the United States and shows no signs of stopping.


These long shutdowns are a sign of widespread safety problems at the reactors. Each such occurrence results from a violation of federal regulations that require plant owners to find and fix safety problems in a timely, effective manner, coupled with the NRC's inability to detect those violations (allowing problems to multiply and worsen as a result). The accident at Three Mile Island might have been prevented had the NRC broken this cycle. snip

I'll get you more, since you don't seem to be able to surf the web for anything but your pro-nuclear propaganda yourself.

[wordpix]

37. in 2007 the NRC security review refused to consider an airstrike on a nuke facility!

:thumbsdown: I guess NRC under King Gorge didn't learn that could happen from 9-11. :crazy: :nuke:

http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_energy/nuclear_safety/nrcs-revised-security.html

Nuclear Plant Sabotage
NRC Ignores Threat of Air Attack on Nuclear Plants

Related Links
in this section
The NRC's Revised Security Regulations

Following the 9/11 tragedy, the NRC initiated what it termed a "top to bottom" review of nuclear power reactor security. As their review progressed, the NRC issued orders and advisories requiring plant owners to implement security upgrades and changes. On January 29, 2007, the NRC's Commissioners voted 5-0 to revise regulations to formally codify all the orders and advisories.

Curiously, the revisions to the regulations resulting from a "top to bottom" review prompted by a tragedy in which terrorists hijacked commercial aircraft and deliberately crashed them into buildings explicitly assume that aircraft will not be used in future attacks on nuclear power plants. The NRC Chairman issued a short statement about the revised regulations and the aircraft omission which began with these two sentences:

"Nuclear power plants are inherently robust structures that our studies show provide adequate protection in a hypothetical attack by an airplane. The NRC has also taken actions that require nuclear plant operators to be able to manage large fires or explosions—no matter what caused them."

Both sentences strain credibility. Study after study conducted by the NRC and for the NRC consistently concluded that reactor meltdowns can occur if aircraft hit nuclear power plants, but consistently accepted that outcome on the low probability that aircraft would accidentally hit a nuclear plant. Clearly, that acceptability is undermined when terrorists intentionally target nuclear plant sites with hijacked aircraft.

[Dogmudgeon]

39. Why would the TERRORists want to hit a reactor?

Oh, right -- they can exploit the irrational fear of radiation caused by 50 years of bad sci-fi and 30 years of anti-nuclear "activism" in the name of The People.

How could I have forgotten? (Actually, I didn't.)

--p!

[wordpix]

40. Who ARE you working for? You still haven't answered the question....

I am guessing a BushCo pro-nuclear group.

[Dogmudgeon]

42. Still lying about me? Pitiful.

Those accusations you throw around are going to backfire.

Your behavior is going to make you look even more stupid, even more sleazy, and even more of an embarrassment to the anti-nuclear movement than you are already.

--p!

[phantom power]

43. It might even reduce his Turing score, due to excessive repitition.

[wordpix]

41. why would they want to hit the WTC or Pentagon?

[Kolesar]

17. You pronuclearists seem to think you can get by with two-sentence pile-on responses

I don't recall if it was you, but my impression since starting to post a lot more here this summer was that if someone had a valid point, you-all would respond with these tangential and terse responses that you thought would prove nuclear supremacy and end the thread. Problem is that not all of us have been reading all of your posts week in an week out.

And many of you were pretty god damned nasty and insulting about it. So even if you did write a decent thesis at some time, it was for nought because you poisoned the forum.

[phantom power]

18. I reserve my sarcasm for points that I think are ridiculous, not valid.

I also, for one, try to reserve my sarcasm for regulars, or newcomers who feel free to make bold assumptions about who I am and what I think, based on my pro-nuke advocacy.

Thirdly, I pretty scrupulously avoid insulting people, unless you count sarcasm as an insult. In which case I insult people right and left, I guess. I don't see it that way.

For instance, I have never, ever told anybody to "fuck off." Or that they are a "fucking asshole." However, I have recently been on the receiving end of at least two such comments (which I had the moderator delete), and the the source of those comments was a frequent anti-nuke advocate here.

So, I don't find accusations of "poisoning the forum" very compelling.

[Kolesar]

19. Getting away from the point that Pidwidgeon says "We look stuff up" implying content...

...when what I read is a lot of terse and dismissive responses that sure as hell are not complete and sufficient to answer the question.

Funny is that you are answering for Pidwidgeon.

[phantom power]

20. The thing is, you were addressing "you pronuclearists," of which I am one...

So, that was why I responded. At any rate, my goal wasn't to speak on behalf of anybody but myself.

[Dogmudgeon]

23. It couldn't have been me

I'm usually faulted for writing too much.

But I enjoy writing. Why should I stop? It is not particularly more or less convincing.

Of course, all pro-nuclearists are accused of being the bad guys. It usually happens right after the accusations of being a Paid Shill™. Anti-nuclearists are assumed to never be wrong in either fact or behavior, and their motives are assumed to be simon-pure. For the antis, it is a culture war every bit as intense as abortion is for conservatives.

As for "piling on", there are at least three of us who have been attacked for posts on DU from other websites, and all of us are pro-nuclear. Curiously, two of the attackers have been self-described "peace activists".

Problem is that not all of us have been reading all of your posts week in and week out.

Certainly. You are at a clear disadvantage because YOU lead balanced and wholesome lives, but WE are obsessively political. We pro-nuclearists can put so much time into our plotting because a) we are paid to do this by Dark Master Cheney, and b) the NNadir Obedience Chip.

Except that the nuke-robot fantasy is wrong. We are like you are -- only that we believe the Left should take back nuclear power, since it holds the greatest promise to solve most of our energy resource problems, and empower the non-developed nations to become developed.

It's interesting how the antis either accuse us of being TOO good at arguing, or portray themselves as being incapable of stooping so low. But we pro-nuclearists got fairly good at arguing only after three decades of getting ridiculed and dogpiled by antis -- who are now outraged that we have started to fight back.

One guy recently posted bitterly five or six times that he had "fewer electrons" than I did. A couple of others repeatedly invoked special pleas earned from suffering that they are convinced is nuclear-caused. Uncle Fred may have lived on top of a toxic waste dump, worked in a chemical factory, and smoked four packs of Luckies a day, but since he drove his convertible across Nevada once in 1958 and died of cancer in 1991, it just had to be the nuke dust.

I'll repeat a point that is often overlooked: some of us would like to take ALL energy issues AWAY from the GOP, the Conservatives, and the pro-corporate political machine (which I am beginning to think includes the antis). We can't do that by:

1. Disowning nuclear energy;
2. Demanding ideological conformity to a 35-year-old philosophy that is based on ignorance and old-fashioned peer pressure;
3. Ignoring the corporate take-over of "renewable" energy; and
4. Appealing entirely to emotion and sentimentality in the guise of "integrating the brain and the heart".

Imagine if you were engaged by several anti-Evolutionists each day. That's what it seems like from OUR side. So if you want a more civil dialog, you are going to have to admit your own culpabilities, too. I can forgive any personal slight, immediately, no questions asked -- but I no longer tolerate abuse. Even in the thick of verbal battle, I consider no one here to be my "enemy" in the slightest way. If my involvement makes me seem like a bad guy, consult the mirror. There is no immaculate innocence on the Internet. To paraphrase Jonathan Edwards, we are all sinners in the hands of a disinterested transfer protocol.

As I have said before, the coming era of crises will break everybody's heart in some way. I may not see a nuclear utopia, and you may not see your own chosen promised land. I am willing to settle (and work) for a peaceful, prosperous, progressive world. I believe that will require nuclear energy, and I am willing to make the case for it. If you think otherwise, make your case, too. But trying to turn this into a schoolyard blame contest won't cut it.

--p!

[Kolesar]

24. Well, that was a fine thesis in its own right. And humorous.

I really don't have time to study it but I do see your view of the "dysfunctional dynamic" in the E&E forum.

[Dead_Parrot]

6. The geniuses on this board know it isn't impossible...

...especially in you're building 26 coal power plants to actually generate your power.

The daily output from those 750 peak megawatts - 4.5 GWh on a good day - will have been exceeded by just one of those new coal plants before the sun even rises.

Still, I guess 5 tons of CO₂ every second, day and night, for the next few decades is a small price to pay to live in Solartopia. They certainly seem determined to build it.

[tom_paine]

11. Hmmmm. Something to consider.

One might argue, two steps forward and one step back, and it is true that these new plants, apparantly, will replace older, more polluting plants currently in use (or did I read that wrong).

Or one might argue it's a hypocritical fraud, though I tend to disagree that it's so black-and-white.

[Dead_Parrot]

22. Indeed

What would be impressive, is if they replaced the old coal plants with solar and wind. Unfortunately, that just isn't possible without a non-existent storage medium. Replacing coal with more coal isn't a step anywhere.

The alternative, of course, would be to shelve their nuclear phase-out: Since they have little scope for hydro, replacing coal with nuclear would seem the obvious choice. It's not like they don't have the experience or engineering ability.

[wordpix]

13. amen to your thought

[kestrel91316]

30. Now this is some SERIOUS swords-into-plowshares:

"......A VAST Soviet military training base located under the often sullen grey skies of former communist East Germany is an unlikely new hub for the world's burgeoning solar energy industry....."

[corbett]

31. Preparing To Ban Coal, Too

Their ardent embrace of solar technology is very commendable, of course, but since they ratified Kyoto, they've been sluggish in their response on the end of coal mining. Now, they have stepped up to the plate in that regard, too. The necessary proposals have been issued.

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2007/08/08/ap4000085.html

[phantom power]

Unfortunately, this is not exactly a phase-out of coal...

its a phase-out of a particular method of mining. They fully intend to continue strip-mining, which is both safer and cheaper.

[corbett]

33. Hmmmmmmm.

Let's hope that they see the light in this regard. The German citizenre is green on the whole.

[phantom power]

34. If the German citizens truly want to ban coal, they will re-adopt nuclear power.

[corbett]

46. Yikes! Out Of The Frying Pan...

[DU GrovelBot]

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[jpak]

35. Grovelbot is solar powered and made in Germany

:evilgrin:

[hunter]

38. Grovelbot is coal powered and made in China.

Most everything is these days.

[Dogmudgeon]

44. Grovelbot is powered by Orgone Energy

You ought to see how it gets its batteries recharged!

--p!

[jpak]

45. Every time I'm in Rangeley, I get me some accumulator time :)

as the saying goes...

They do it Strangely in Rangeley...