Share this page!

Enter URL or ID to Unroll

You can paste full URL like: https://x.com/threadreaderapp/status/1644127596119195649
or just the ID like: 1644127596119195649

How to get URL link on X (Twitter) App

  1. On the Twitter thread, click on or icon on the bottom
  2. Click again on or Share Via icon
  3. Click on Copy Link to Tweet
  4. Paste it above and click "Unroll Thread"!
  5. More info at Twitter Help
Mark Nelson Profile picture
@energybants
Apr 2 • 4 tweets • 2 min read • Read on X
Depressing to watch electricity production crashing in Germany year by year.

We can all see what they're doing to themselves.

Maybe other EU nations enjoy seeing the decline of Germany?

It's almost unfathomable to me as an American to watch Europe sleepwalking into this.

1/4 Image
Fossil fuel prices have collapsed.

Germany has taken renewable subsidies out of power bills & and placed them into the national budget to attempt to stop electricity price rises.

Yet, load this quarter is flat from last year, with Germany now a power-importing nation.

2/4 Image
Part of the problem is that weather is just so variable.

Germany installed tens of billions of € of renewable capacity since Dec. 2019 but produced no more power in 1Q of 2024 compared to 1Q 2020.

Will 2024 be a good year or bad year? Fun to guess. Less fun for industry.

3/4
Image
Image
Electricity production in Germany has fallen to levels last seen 4 decades ago, while national power demand has fallen to levels last seen, briefly, during a recession year in 1993.

And yet, Germany is supposed to be ELECTRIFYING its economy, not shrinking demand.

Grim.

4/4
Image
Image

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
　

Keep Current with Mark Nelson

Mark Nelson Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @energybants

Mark Nelson Profile picture
Jan 6
Incredible: German electricity demand has fallen to the lowest levels since before reunification in 1990, as its economy falters.

Germany intentionally turned off its extraordinarily cheap and reliable baseload nuclear power, rapidly, during a generational energy crisis.

Putin didn't make them do it.

America didn't make them do it.

Even German public opinion has turned dramatically back in favor of nuclear.

German leaders made this choice, to turn them off and keep them off.

Look at these graphs of annual electricity. It's like Germany is committing WW2-style bombing raids against its own infrastructure.

If Germany were electrifying, for either climate or growth reasons, then we would expect electricity demand to grow, not fall.

We should be seeing all time records in electricity production and demand, not the lowest numbers in over three decades.

Now electricity is too expensive for many industries to justify using for expanding or even maintaining production, so electricity demand is dropping.

But Germany's own generation of electricity is plunging even faster than its demand is, turning Germany from a net exporter to a net importer of power.

Many commenters have celebrated the falling energy costs in Germany for this year and next. But those falling costs are coming along with falling demand for power, not increasing demand.

And costly renewable subsidies are no longer paid directly on power bills, but instead from the national budget, lowering the apparent cost of power even further, which should be stimulating demand.

Yet electricity remains so persistently expensive relative to pre-crisis years that, in combination with expensive natural gas, it just isn't worth it for Germany's major energy consumers.

Germany's courts have, for now, rejected adding more and more subsidies for energy production infrastructure to be paid for by national debt.

Even though this is a crisis for Germany, the courts seem wise in rejecting subsidies for expensive new energy when cheap nuclear plants could just be turned back on.

Leading opposition parties have already stated their intention of restarting Germany's nuclear plants should they win power.

This would take about a year each, but each nuclear plant would prop up a meaningful fraction of Germany's bleeding industrial sector.

In my view, there is no longer any other budget-neutral or budget-positive energy move available to German leaders, without destroying Germany's climate agreements to turn on lignite coal full blast.Article from Bloomberg: Germany's Lost Year is Over But 2024 May Not Be Much Better https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-01-06/germany-s-lost-year-is-over-but-2024-may-not-be-much-better
From Energy-Charts.info: Total electricity production from all sources in Germany, from 1990 through 2023, showing remarkable drop from 611 TWh in 2017 to 487 in 2023. Electrification of previously off-grid energy consumption, in a healthy economy, should have led to a growth in electricity supply, not a drop. https://energy-charts.info/charts/energy/chart.htm?l=en&c=DE&year=-1&stacking=stacked_absolute&chartColumnSorting=default&interval=year&source=total&legendItems=000111111111111111100111111110
Retitled chart from Energy-Charts: Nuclear output in Germany and Total Electricity Load (nation demand) in Germany https://energy-charts.info/charts/energy/chart.htm?l=en&c=DE&year=-1&stacking=stacked_absolute&chartColumnSorting=default&interval=year&source=total&legendItems=000100000000000000000000000001
I have to keep writing this over and over and over again:

France badly mismanaged its nuclear fleet as it tried to foolishly ape German energy policy.

France has had some of worst nuclear fleet availability on Earth.

Germany had among the highest.
I've been yelling about France's energy self-sabotage for years.

I used the phrase "Vichy Energy" to describe France's policies in this podcast warning about France, Germany, and Nord Stream, from more than a year before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine
decouplemedia.org/podcast/episod…
Read 4 tweets
Mark Nelson Profile picture
Jun 6, 2023
ZAPORIZHZHIA NUCLEAR: LOSS OF KAKHOVKA DAM

Zaporizhzhia NPP, Europe's largest, draws cooling water from a reservoir whose dam is now severely damaged.

All six reactors are off & cold. Almost no cooling water needed.

Unfolding event, but not a serious risk for nuclear accident. Satellite image showing the...
Nuclear reactors produce an immense amount of heat when operating.

Massive amounts of water are passed through to keep them at the right temperature, and this water gets heated up and is used to make steam and then the steam to make electricity.

Zaporizhzhia's reactors are off.
The reactors at Fukushima Daiichi shut down after the quake, but three still melted.

That's because right after shutdown, reactors keep putting out a lot of heat, and the tsunami destroyed the backup cooling equipment.

Zaporizhzhia's reactors have been shut off for many months.
Read 8 tweets
Mark Nelson Profile picture
Apr 17, 2023
First night of Germany's grid without nuclear: it's bad.

It's night. No sun. Wind has dropped to almost nothing.

Most of German "renewables" right now is richly-subsidized bioenergy with half the net CO2 emissions of an efficient gas power plant.

Importing nuclear from France. Snapshot of European electr...Screenshot from Electricity...
It's hard to express how insane this situation is.

Highlighting just wind production now, Germany's 66.5 GW of installed wind is only producing as much as the 3 reactors that turned off last night used to produce.

400% expansion of wind would only provide half present need! Image
It's astounding to me when people argue that it isn't fair to choose just a moment when Germany's wind and solar are near zero, that we have to look at yearly figures instead.

So here's every single hour for a year and the annual average.

And for France.
A chart of hourly carbon in...
Read 4 tweets
Mark Nelson Profile picture
Apr 14, 2023
NOBEL LAUREATES, CLIMATE SCIENTISTS CALL ON GERMAN CHANCELLOR TO SAVE NUCLEAR PLANTS

In an open letter, Nobel Physics winners Klaus von Klitzing and Stephen Chu, plus dozens more scientists and economists, call on Schulz to reverse course.

German press *heavily* covering this. German Nobel Physics Laurea...American Nobel Physics Laur...
The letter explains nuclear's crucial role in energy security and climate protection.

Text and signatories were released this morning by international environmental NGO @letsreplanet a day before scheduled nuclear phaseout in Germany.

English version:

replanet.ngo/post/open-lett… Text of letter: Dear Chanc...The Emsland, Isar II and Ne...For these reasons, in the i...
The letter has already been covered this morning by leading German newspapers such as @welt, @Tagesspiegel, @berlinerzeitung, @BILD, @focusonline, and the New York Times.

Links to coverage are available along with original German text from @ReplanetDACH:
replanet-dach.eu/offener-brief-… ImageImageImageImage
Read 4 tweets
Mark Nelson Profile picture
Mar 1, 2023
I talk to people about energy around the world

Nuclear is very "lumpy"

What happens to a reactor in Japan exerts a powerful force on what people think about ALL nuclear

"Illegal wind turbines on indigenous land" is not something city folk realized is happening

Now, they will.
I'm from a part of the USA where reversing wind industry abuses is a legal issue for native tribes

I can assure you the vast majority of people supporting the massive expansion of wind energy are unaware of this

Due to Greta, they are about to learn more about their own country
There have been few voices more consistent on this issue than @KetanJ0

Because he is in Norway, he also has a front row seat to how a population can turn against wind energy for a variety of reasons

When he tried to warn Americans about this on here, he was abused as a "NIMBY"
Read 4 tweets
Mark Nelson Profile picture
Feb 28, 2023
Germany: we must turn off our reactors because of the meltdowns in Japan of reactors unlike those we operate induced by geology we don't have

Japan: alright ten years moping is enough let's get back to nuclear to lower those power bills

Something's rotten in German leadership.
I say something's rotten in German leadership because both Germany and Japan now have majorities in favor of continuing nuclear power.

Both nations have severe domestic energy supply deficits made up by massive imports.

I guess Germany has vast lignite mines unlike Japan?
German nuclear plants are among the most labor-efficient in the world, with about 300 full-time employees needed to run a plant that makes power for over a million people. Those employees train new employees before retiring.

This couldn't be more wrong:
Read 4 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!

This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

Send Email!

:(