Germany 100 Percent Renewables by 2050

Sets an example for all industrial nations Dr. Mae-Wan Ho and Prof. Peter Saunders

The UK’s Low Carbon Transition Plan [1] (see UK’s Lacklustre Low Carbon Transition Plan, SiS 44) falls well short of the challenges that face us. Fortunately, we need look no further than across the North Sea to Germany for inspiration. Germany is a large, prosperous, industrialised country rather like the UK in many ways. It has traditionally relied heavily on coal for electricity generation, and has a number of nuclear power plants. But there the similarities end.

Renewable energies exclude nuclear

While the UK’s White Paper envisages the Great Britain of 2020 or 2050 as much the same as today, Germany is looking forward to a quite different future in which Germany will guarantee for itself a secure energy supply and maintain its position as a world leader in new technology.  It is forging ahead in the development and use of renewable energy; and nuclear power - seen in the UK as a major component of the future energy mix - is being phased out altogether.

The nearest equivalent in Germany to the British White Paper is a document issued by the German government in January 2009, with the title New Thinking – New Energy. Ten Guiding Principles for a Sustainable Energy Supply [2].

The document sets out the following objectives:

· By 2020, greenhouse gas emissions are to be reduced by 40 per cent from their 1990 levels – double the UK target. (By the end of 2007 emissions had already been reduced by 21.3 per cent.)

· Energy productivity should be increased by 3 per cent every year, so that in 2020 energy will be used twice as efficiently as in 1990

· The proportion of energy that comes from renewables should be increased. By 2050, half of primary energy consumption should come from renewable sources. By 2020, the proportions of final energy consumption, gross electricity consumption and energy used for heating that come from renewables should be double their current levels (which are 9 per cent, 15 per cent and 7 per cent, respectively).

· By 2020, a quarter of energy production should come from combined heat and power generation (CHP), again double the present level.

· The use of biofuels should be increased so that by 2020, 7 per cent of the greenhouse gas emissions due to fossil fuels are eliminated.

100 percent renewables by 2050

But speaking to the press [3] David Wortmann, Director of Renewable Energy and Resources at Germany Trade and Invest, a government body supporting the country’s renewable energy sector, expressed the view that Germany could be 100 percent renewables-powered by 2050. 'It's ambitious, but Germany can be running on renewable energy by 2050 if there is the political will,' he said.

In 2008, Germany’s primary energy consumed was 7.3 percent renewable, and that figure is predicted to increase to 33 percent by 2020. At that rate of increase, it could well be 100 percent renewable by 2050.

Part of what makes that possible is to use less energy by increasing energy efficiency. The Roadmap lays out a raft of new energy efficiency measures including the construction of a smart grid that should reduce consumption by 28 percent in the next two decades: from 13 842 PJ in 2007 to 12 000 PJ in 2020 and 10 000 PJ in 2030. This will mean enormous savings on costly energy imports.

Another strategy is to make full use of German’s natural wind resources concentrated along the northern coastlines, where huge offshore wind parks in the North Sea could generate as much as 10 GW or more (see later), feeding electricity into a smart national grid connecting the north and east of the country and south and west with optimal efficiency using high voltage direct current.

Solar energy will be imported via Italy from the solar thermal plants to be built in the sun soaked deserts of North Africa (but see Chapter 12 of [4] Green Energies - 100% Renewable by 2050, I-SIS publication).

Electric powered cars rechargeable from renewable energy sources will be racing down Germany’s Autobahns and cut greenhouse emissions substantially.

“The technical capacity is available for the country to switch over to green energy, so it is a question of political will and the right regulatory framework,” Wortman said. Germany plans to use all the renewable energy sources at its disposal, wind, solar, geothermal, hydropower and biomass in an optimum mix.

Wortman praised the government for its plans to invest more into research. “Germany has been a centre of innovation in renewable energy technologies for years. There is a real desire to see it continue to be a place where new central renewable energy technologies are development. Not only the government, but also companies are focussing more resources on research.” Wortman said.

He predicted that bio-energy will play a key role, but only where it is sustainable and did not compete with food crops or supplies. In 2008, biomass supplied 3.7 percent of the electricity in Germany, up from 3.1 percent in 2007; while wind power’s share increased by 0.1 percent from 6.4 to 6.5 percent.

He singled out a biogas electricity plant developed by Dr. Michael Stelter of the Fraunhofer Institute for Ceramic Technologies and Systems in Dresden that use compost and waste.  A new procedure that uses enzymes to break down cellulose in compost waste means that the plant produces 30 percent more biogas and does this in 30 days, rather than the current 80 days.

To optimize efficiency, the biogas is pumped into fuel cells that operate at 850 ˚C, allowing the plant to convert biogas methane to electricity at 40 to 55 percent efficiency. Taking into account the heat produced, the fuel cell has a conversion rate of 85 percent.

Strong government support for renewables

Germany has stolen a march on other member states of the European Union and most of the rest of the world in launching its low carbon transition in earnest more than a decade ago. Germany’s renewable energy policy really began in 1974 after the first oil crisis, and consisted almost exclusively in promoting research for the first 15 years [5]. Market creation measures only came after 1988; of these the most important was the Feed-in Law.  From 1991 to 1995, under the 1 000 roof programme, applicants received 50 percent of investment costs from the federal government plus 20 percent from the Land government. Eventually 2 250 roofs were equipped with photovoltaic (PV) modules, producing a total of about 5 MW.

For wind energy, the government introduced a programme for subsidising 100 MW – later 250 MW – by a payment of €0.04/kWh (later reduced to €0.03). This was accompanied by the Feed-in Law that obliges national electricity utilities to buy electricity generated from renewable sources at above-market rates set by the government. As a result, newly installed wind capacity shot up from about 20 MW in 1989 to over 1 100 MW in 1995. In subsequent years, these subsidies declined rapidly, and the Feed-in Law barely survived attacks from the conventional electricity generators.

Significant improvement came after the 1998 election, when the ‘red-green’ coalition came into office, and strengthened renewable energy support, especially for PV and biomass, thanks also to activists and municipal utilities. Eurosolar’s 100 000 roof proposal since 1996 and the German Solar Energy Industries Association, played key roles in the continued growth of the PV market after the 1 000 roof programme.

The new federal government emphasized ecological modernisation and climate change policy as well as job creation and socio-economic development. It included eco-tax on energy, phasing out nuclear power and strengthening renewable energy sources and combined heat and power generation for increased efficiency of energy use.

The government’s measures to promote renewable energy included a five-year market incentive programme that provided about € 445 million from 1999 to 2002; a tax break on bio-fuels in keeping with a EU directive; and most importantly, it adopted the 100,000 roof programme for PV, and the Renewable Energy Sources Act adopted in 2000 and substantially amended in 2004.  This new Law repealed the Feed-in Law of 1990 but maintained an essential feature, i.e., the reliance on feed-in tariffs to encourage the development of renewable energy sources for electricity. This has given German PV and other renewable technologies a further boost. In 2006, Germany accounted for 56 per cent of the world’s solar energy technology market and around 80 per cent of the European market [6].

Germany already generates 6.5 per cent of electricity from wind [4] and is planning to increase this amount. In September 2009, the cabinet announced plans for up to 40 offshore wind parks holding as many as 2 500 turbines and projected to generate 12 GW by 2030 [7]

There are also plans for other sources including biogas, small hydroelectric plants and geothermal.  In July 2009, a large group of German companies announced a joint investment of €400 billion ($560 billion) in concentrated solar power (CSP) plants in the Sahara Desert. These are seen as making significant contributions to the total energy supply but are also important because the energy supply is predictable or storable and can provide a buffer against fluctuations in other sources (but see Chapter 12 of [2] for strong reservations on big CSP projects).

No nuclear or carbon capture and storage

Unlike the UK government, the Germans are confident that they can achieve their aims without nuclear power. In 2002 they decided to phase out their nuclear plants by 2022, and while the present Chancellor, Angela Merkel, is known to favour extending the stations’ lifetimes beyond that date, there is little support for building any new reactors. Public opinion in Germany is against nuclear energy especially after the July 2009 incident in which the Krümmel nuclear reactor had to be shut down for the second time in two years and the revelation of problems at the Gorleben site, which is intended for long term storage of nuclear waste [8].

Germany has traditionally relied very heavily on coal and so like the UK, is actively pursuing research into CCS. Vattenfall, a Swedish-German firm, has applied for EU funding to help it build a 385 MW demonstration plant [9]. Germany is not, however, depending on CCS to help it achieve its emissions targets in the same way that the UK is. In particular, it is not included in their plan for reaching their 2020 target because they do expect it to be commercially available by then. Instead, while they will still be generating 40 per cent of their electricity from coal, the emissions will be reduced by increasing the efficiency of the plants, by having more combined heat and power CHP installations, and by an 11 per cent reduction in total energy consumption.  If CCS proves successful, they will be well placed to take advantage of it; if it does not, they have other strings to their bow.

Germany, in sharp contrast to the UK, is looking forward to a future in which more and more, if not all of its energy comes from renewable sources. It clearly sees this as an opportunity: the creation of 500 000 new jobs and establishing Germany as a major exporter of renewable technologies; and substantially reducing energy imports

Transport and airline tax

Like the UK, Germany is looking at specific measures to reduce carbon emissions from the transport sector, such as improving the efficiency of vehicles and moving traffic from road to rail and from private cars to public transport. But the Germans start with the advantage of a superior rail network. Unlike their British counterparts, the German Federal Department for the Environment is advocating that airlines pay tax on aviation fuel and VAT on tickets for international flights, thus removing a major subsidy to the industry [10].

No carbon trading

While the UK White Paper assumes that carbon trading will make an important contribution to meeting the country’s emissions target, the UBA explicitly states that Germany aims to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by measures implemented within Germany itself.

Article first published 14/10/09

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References

1. Saunders PT and Cherry B. UK’s lackluster low carbon transition plan. Science in Society 44.
2. Ho MW, Cherry B, Burcher S and Saunders PT. Green Energies, 100 % Renewables by 2050, ISIS/TWN Report, London and Penang, 2010, https://www.i-sis.org.uk/GreenEnergies.php
3. New Thinking - New Energy, Zehn Leitsätze für eine nachhaltige Energieversorgung Ten Principles for a Sustainable Energy, Federal Minstry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety, January 2009, http://www.bmu.de/english/energy_efficiency/doc/44006.php
4. “Germany: the world’s first major renewable energy economy”, Jane Burgermeister, 3 April 2009, Renewable Energy World.com, http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/04/germany-the-worlds-first-major-renewable-energy-economy
5. Lauber V  and Mez L. Three decades of renewable electricity policies in Germany. Energy & Environment 2004, 15, 599-623.
6. “German legislation generates photovoltaic leadership”, Sian Harris, SPIE, 19 October 2007, http://spie.org/x17246.xml?ArticleID=x17246
7. “Alternative energy at sea. German cabinet approves massive expansion of offshore wind farm”, Spiegel Online, 18 September 2009, http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,649219,00.html
8. “Krümmel accident puts question mark over Germany’s nuclear future”, Spiegel Online, 13 July 2009, http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,635788,00.html
9. “Vattenfall hopeful on German CCS project”, Reuters, 8 September 2009, World Business Council for Sustainable Development, http://www.wbcsd.org/plugins/DocSearch/details.asp?type=DocDet&ObjectId=MzU2MDI
10. Wachsmann U, Erdmenger C, Müschen K, and Lehmann H. 40% reduction of CO2 emissions by 2020 – Germany’s path towards a sustainable energy system, 2009, http://www.rio9.com/programme/Book_of_Proceedings/35_Mueschen_Neu.pdf