Global corruption in natural resource industry
Though there are many admirable people working in the oil and gas industry, the global enterprise of extracting hydrocarbons has a long history that continues to present in which incredible sums of money are concentrated into the hands of unsavory people. The world’s banking industry often holds its collective nose and continues dealing with the despicable because they claim ownership of large quantities of cash that should be more widely distributed to the legitimate owners of the places where resources have been extracted.
This TED talk by Charmian Gooch of Global Witness and the sources provided in the text version provide strong support for my above assertions.
Researchers from Ida Tarbell to Daniel Yergin to Robert Baer have been documenting similar types of behavior for more than 100 years. Global Witness continues to probe the oil and gas industry and to advocate transparency rules that seek to reduce the negative effects of what it calls the resource curse.
With a questioning attitude, it is not a difficult leap to imagine that some of the ill-gotten gains from extracting oil and gas have been spent in an effort to discourage competition from nuclear energy because of its proven ability to increase the world’s accessible energy supply, reduce the market power of fossil fuel suppliers, and create a long term weakness in world energy market prices. (A case can be made that low oil and gas prices from 1986 through 2000 were strongly influenced by the construction of enough nuclear power plants between 1963 and 1983 to eventually inject the equivalent of 12 million barrels of oil per day into the world market.)
Want to end the resource curse ? Go nuclear : The equitable fuel …
How could you grease your hands with worldwide consumption of only 165 million pounds.
Congratulations to Charmian Gooch, she is a very courageous woman.
Corruption is also rampant in Russia where civil servants and government employees are milking the nation’s assets and buying all of the prime real estate in Greece, Portugal and Spain and living lives that they do not deserve. The legal system in Russia is non existent.
Or maybe :
Want to end the resource curse ? Go nuclear : The only clean fuel
Why not “Want to end the resource curse ? Go nuclear : The only equitable clean fuel.”
Rod,
Back in 2009 when I had finally finished all the numbers for Nuclear power personally. The size of the fuel. The actual dangers of radiation. The availability of fuel long term. The flexibility of the systems to adapt to many types of power needs. I began to understand that this technology was and is being suppressed by people who have strong vested interests in keeping the status quo. I understood that if I wanted to promote Nuclear power, I would be mis-understood, often rejected, and many times called a liar.
At the time, I had been studying many of the “self-help” style energy sources, micro-hydro, micro wind, solar, wave and some of the larger renewable sources like hydro and geo-thermal. I helped to network a deal between a British company and a business man growing plants for bio-fuels. During that time in my life, I would spend my Sunday afternoon rest time playing with spreadsheets on energy. Working for a non-profit in a very poor country, and having business background and engineering tendencies I found myself constantly looking for solutions that would actually work and pay for themselves. I had no pony in the show other than providing ways to help friends of mine eat, work and live in something a bit less than grinding poverty. My salary was paid and I was fine, but I had many friends who were NOT fine. Still do.
Then I ran across Nuclear power. As I began to calculate the energy density, I was AMAZED! Megawatts from a football sized sphere! I kept checking and rechecking to make sure I was understanding what I was reading correctly. I began to look at my living room and understand that you could power New York city with a core about that size. I was living in an Asian MegaCity at the time and we were so used to rolling blackouts that we had the steps memorized for plugging in the generator. My kids could do it. Now, I know that there are many causes for blackouts but one of the primary ones is simply too many people and too little power to spread around. One city had an unemployment rate of between 20 to 35% depending on which nose you were counting today. They opened up call centers that employed only about 100 people. These call centers – in a city of a million people – brought down the grid. Rolling blackouts.
I began to understand that Nuclear power was not A solution. It was THE solution. Especially SMR’s. Most of the people in Asia live on Islands or in rural areas that are so remote a 4 wheel drive is necessary to reach them. These are places where vast civilizations used to live and who used up their natural resources. Nuclear power would have small deliveries every few years and in the mean time, a small group of highly trained locals could manage the plant. This would fit well with the needs of islands and remote areas where pipelines are hard to build and roads are still not massive tanker sized yet.
Suddenly I saw the corruption in the power industry. Both through deduction and personal contact. Being raised an American I was used to wealthy people who became that way because of smarts and hard work. I had several friends like this and they were some of the most common people you could know. Our family friends growing up were like this – managed to become millionaires doing what the government failed at – loaning money to poor people in order to put them into homes. But when the economy turned down my friends refused to foreclose on these folks and they lost their millions. These were the kind of “wealthy” people I was used to.
Coming to Asia and understanding the vast amount of wealth changing hands in the power industry (and others) opened my eyes. I found a wealthy class that cares nothing for the poor. Watching the global power market manipulations in 2008 made me mad. These manipulations still make me mad. The high prices take food right out of the mouths of friends. And there is NO need for those high prices. Despite the flailing of some, well run and well regulated Nuclear power is the least expensive power on the planet. It cost less that every other source in nearly every possible measurement once built. NPP’s are nearly the same price as a new coal plant in the USA. And with proper regulations could be built for even less than a new coal plant. That’s on today’s LWR technology! I am a LFTR fan, but I don’t see any need to stop building LWR’s until LFTR comes along.
Yes, there is old fashion corruption, there are under the table deals. There is also the corruption that happens when an industry becomes bed fellows with a government. Paying taxes – which the Oil and Gas industry do at many levels – makes sure that governments want them around. One of the hidden “problems” with Nuclear is that there is not nearly as many opportunities for officials to line their pockets. There are some but not nearly as many points of contact as with Fossil fuels. I could expand on that but this is already long.
Thanks for the good video on global corruption. I am heartened.
@David
Kazakhstan, the country that mines by far the most uranium for your nuclear,
is one of the worst corrupt countries with an awful dictatorship.
They mined 21K ton of the world mine production of 58K ton (=more than one third!).
You find similar countries on the list of uranium produces / mines.
Rod,
As active member of Amnesty International my compliments for this this thread!
Thank you.
It may help to improve life in those countries!
@David
I’d like to promote your post to the front page. It would help people understand it a little better if you could provide some sketchy biographical details that I could use to introduce you and your perspective. I fully understand if you want to remain mostly anonymous and use just your rather common first name.
Even the recently started French war (Jan. 2013) in Gabon has a lot to do with the uranium ore stocks in the ground of Mali and the uranium mines in Niger.
That war is still going on, but hardly known as the French military keep journalists out.
Niger, the world’s fourth uranium ore producing country (~5K ton) delivers its ore mainly to France.
Mali is important for France in several ways:
– it is needed for its mining in Niger because of the roads towards the sea
– it has uranium stocks in the ground
– a radical Islamic government in Mali may affect Niger in several ways.
* The working conditions of the miners in Niger may have to be improved (money)
* Niger’s government position may change also into French hostile (e.g. nationalize the uranium mines in order to keep the big profit’s for the Niger ‘people’)
@Bas
Bull. Mali’s uranium resource base is less than a one year supply for France’s nuclear industry. Niger is important, but still only supplies about 1/3 of France’s needs.
Rod,
I have worked in Southeast Asia for over 13 years for a non-profit. I took a short break for a couple of years and did research for building a Bio-fuel electric plant in the USA. Some of my responsibilities include coordinating various community development projects, wells, buildings, and small business development. I have traveled extensively around Southeast Asia and Micronesia, with occasional trips to many of the countries in Asia and the Pacific. I work mainly in leadership development, training and education. I sat on the boards of 3 educational institutions and currently work with a 4th. Since I move around countries that are still not friendly to my home country, I have to be careful about making any statements that could be deemed political.
@Gareth and Daniel, as long as nuclear power relies on depletable fuels like uranium or even rare earth minerals, it (and even batteries, EVs, renewables, and other clean technology) will all be prone to at least one variant of the resource curse.
It is almost an outright lie to say that nuclear power will ever have a fuel supply problem. Between the easily accessible uranium and thorium reserves, not to mention the already mined U-238, and the almost infinite supply of uranium in the ocean, there will NEVER be a fissile/fertile material supply crisis, unless it is politically driven.
Agree.
It’s mainly protection of the uranium ore transport line through Mali and their mines in Niger.
If that bothers you, you should be in favor of an immediate, all-out effort to shift to thorium breeders and fast-spectrum reactors. Those two technologies could produce the total human energy consumption from about 5000 tons of material per year, roughly none of which would come from Kazakhstan; it is all either a byproduct of rare-earth refining, or already in inventory.
There’s an effort to denature (destroy) and bury the USA’s stock of U-233†, so the prospect of politically-driven “shortages” is very real.
† This U-233 could be the starter charge for a number of thorium breeder reactors.
Yes, there are billions of tons of uranium in the oceans. Uranium of course is a radioactive material. Considering the contention of some antis that even minuscule amount of radioactive material in the environment is a disaster you would think they would be ecstatic at the prospect of some of it being removed.
I have read about this and am disgusted that we may waste this incredibly valuable material. It will truly be a tragedy if they down blend it.
Makes you wonder how many of those antis insist on using “sea salt” doesn’t it?
Go ahead, salt your food with it. You know it contains uranium, right?
@Engineer-Poet,
I’m in favor of an immediate, all-out effort to shift to fusion (ITER, etc).
As that may deliver a real solution! Cheaper than solar will do.
Looking at:
– the problems with the small thorium reactor of Oak Ridge (especiall decommissioning);
– the time/effort the Chinese/Indian cooperation need to develop an utility scale one (>10years);
even with an all-out effort, those won’t run before 2030.
So they must be competition capable in the period 2030 – 2070.
At that time those thorium reactors will be substantially more expensive than renewable.
In ~2040 the price of solar will be ~2-3cent/kWh. Wind somewhat more.
At that time base load PP’s no longer needed (check Germany’s scenario).
Fast load following PP’s needed such as fluidized bed waste/bio/coal plants.
As those use low temperature burning which allows for thin steel pipes, etc.
So those are more flexible (faster up-/down-regulation) than gas plants.
In combination with waste burning, pumped storage, conversion of electricity into gas & fuel (Germany and Scotland develop pilot plants), a 100% renewable can be realized.
Even if electricity from solar was free, it would still be too expensive because of the costs of dealing with intermittency. This is something you repeatedly refuse to acknowledge. You’re like a brainless parrot, BAS.
Everywhere which has subscribed to wind or solar has seen substantial increases in the cost of electricity because a larger portion of their electricity then comes from spot market purchases, rather than base load and spot market electricity is 4 – 20 times as expensive as base load.
Even when unreliables drive spot market prices down at some times of day, when they are unavailable the spot market price goes up even more, because the generators for spot market electricity must make their fixed costs and their cost to be available, no matter how small a percentage of the day they are actually used.
And the generators for spot market electricity are absolutely necessary and cannot be eliminated under any unreliables plan.
So no matter how cheap you make unreliable electricity, it still costs more than getting it from a reliable base load generator.
The real world supports these facts. Your assertions are a bunch of cherry picked pipe dreams. Show me somewhere where electricity prices went down after unreliables were installed.
In Austin, TX, which gets a fairly small percentage of its electricity from unreliables, our rates have gone *up* by 20%, at a time when natural gas prices are at all time lows, because the city has subscribed to unreliables. Even though the individual subscribers pay the slighly higher price for the unreliables electricity, all our rates went up, because the city is now purchasing a much larger amount of spot market electricity and those spot market purchases are billed to everyone, not just the unreliables subscribers.
So, show me in the real world where unreliables actually lowered the price for an entire city of consumers. Not cherry picked ten minutes worth of spot market solar driven prices. I want to see a total grid effect where electricity actually gets cheaper.
You can’t do it, because it never happens. Unreliables put such a cost on the grid, that even a small percentage of unreliables drives up the overall cost of electricity substantially for the entire grid.
@Jeff
“…spot market electricity is 4 – 20 times as expensive as base load…”
If that is true, people rush to install cheap gas turbine and produce/sell only when the price is so high.
So it is temporary. If not, it is bad management by the responsible in Austin.
Germany shows that that is not true. Average spot market prices went down substantially. This year so far that their old NPP’s get a difficult P&L situation. And life will become worse for NPP owners, as renewable continue to grow (cost price down at ~7%/year).
“… generators for spot market … necessary and cannot be eliminated..”
Agree, of course.
So pumped storage facilities are upgraded within Germany, upgrades / new line to use of the huge pumped storage potential of Norway, pilot plant to convert electricity into gas and other fuel, etc.
The internal grid is upgraded so wind from the north and solar from the south can fill in local gaps. Discussion about a line to Spain as the wind blows in Spain when little wind at the north-sea, and vice-versa.
Furthermore, for filling the gaps in the intermediate period, German utilities build power plants that can burn waste, biomass, coal and lignite. And that are highly flexible due to the low burning temperatures of the fluidized bed technology (so steel tubes can be thin which contributes to fast up-/down-regulation).
Important that capital investment in the power plant is low, as the gaps during which renewable do not produce enough electricity will become smaller…
“…Show … where electricity prices went down after unreliables were installed..”
In local markets yes (some islands converted towards 100% renewable because it was cheaper). For people with solar panels on their roof it became cheaper as well.
If you take off all subsidies for nuclear, coal, gas plants. And raise the CO2 tax to a decent level, then renewable is already cheaper.
But don’t worry.
Electricity from unsubsidized solar (PV panels), including the costs of grid and storage adaptations, will become cheaper than electricity from highly (liability) subsidized NPP’s before 2040.
In my posts at the “Pandora’s Promise and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. – What we missed” thread, I explain calculations and you find links (check those of El as well).
“@Jeff
“…spot market electricity is 4 – 20 times as expensive as base load…”
If that is true, people rush to install cheap gas turbine and produce/sell only when the price is so high.
So it is temporary. If not, it is bad management by the responsible in Austin.”
BAS, slow down and use your brain for a moment. I know this is asking you to engage in a novel activity, but give it a try.
There’s enough capacity. The problem is that the entire cost of the required back up systems, those gas turbines, must be paid for while operating maybe 30% of the time. All the fixed costs must be divided amongst a small amount of electricity, causing the cost of the electricity to be extremely high. Building more turbines wouldn’t solve that, it would make it worse.
But one can’t do with fewer turbines, because they’re all needed some of the time when the wind and sun aren’t available.
Again, it doesn’t matter how cheap you make wind and solar, you still pay the full costs for full peak demand generating capacity in fossil fuels. No matter how cheap you make the wind and solar, that cost will not go away, and so you’re always going to create expensive electricity.
And the reality is that the capital costs of wind and solar are vastly more than other methods, including nuclear, so the customer is paying a factor of three or more for unreliables.
“…The problem is that the entire cost of the required back up systems, those gas turbines, must be paid for while operating maybe 30% of the time. ..”
In the nineties the Germans spent ~$200million for scenario studies to find out the best way and the right time-schedules. The in 1999 adopted transition scenario covers a period of 50years and end in 2050 with 80% of all electricity being renewable.
This looks as if Austin management just took decisions…
So indeed they did a very bad job.
“In the nineties the Germans spent ~$200million for scenario studies to find out the best way and the right time-schedules. The in 1999 adopted transition scenario covers a period of 50years and end in 2050 with 80% of all electricity being renewable.
This looks as if Austin management just took decisions…
So indeed they did a very bad job.”
Yes, they did. They subscribed to unreliables.
I don’t know what you think describing Germany’s plan proves. All it shows is that the folks who did the planning, probably policy wonks who deluded themselves that they understood engineering, were idiots. Their plan is not working and will never work.
These plans are all stupid. All one need do is look at the real world results. You seem to be incapable of doing that.
In 20 – 30 years from date of installation, all of those solar and wind installations will fail and require replacement. By 2030, long before the 2050 plan end, the Germans will have to start re-purchasing all the wind and solar that they’ve installed so far as it wears out. Additionally, there is no fund to pay for the decommissioning and disposal. How is Germany going to pay for that?
The Germans have already spent over $280 billion. They generate no more than 80 TWHr of electricity from wind and solar per year, or 110 TWHr if one includes biomass.
For $280 billion Germany could have bought 35 – 55 nuclear reactors, assuming $8 billion – $5 billion per reactor respectively. If each reactor generates 8 TWHr/year, then Germany could have had 280 – 440 TWHr/year of reliable, clean, CO2 free electricity for the same money by now.
So, for the same money Germany has already spent, they could have had 2.5 to 5 or 6 times more electricity and none of it would have required fossil fuel backup.
BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE!</i?
As mentioned above, wind and solar will wear out in 20 – 30 years. Nuclear reactors last for at least 60 years and new ones will probably be good for 100 years. So for the same money spent, Germany actually could have gotten 7.5 – 18 times as much electricity, and better electricity because it would reliable and available on demand.
Furthermore, I used a very conservative 1 GW per nuclear reactor and 8000 hours per year of operation. Let's assume they build current models at 1.6 GW and go to 7000 hours per year to allow margin for load following. Then each reactor actually generates 11.2 TWHr/year.
This means that using current, modern reactors of 1.6 GW capacity, operating at a modest 80% capacity factor, Germany could have had 10.5 – 25 times as much CO2-free electricity for the money that they have ALREADY spent.
Now tell me again how clever their plan is? Under your clever plan, the Germans have already spent $280 billion and will have to accelerate that spending to replace failing installations of unreliables and continue to increase installed base. All of it requires a capacity of fossil fuel backup equal to the full demand, and emits CO2 as that backup stays active. Germany hasn’t even made a dent in their CO2 emissions and they’ve spent more than quarter of a trillion dollars.
If they had spent that same money on nuclear reactors instead, they would now have from half to all of their electricity converted to CO2-free nuclear. That’s right, for the same money already spent, Germany could have replaced ALL their electricity generation with nuclear and be done by now.
Do you care about CO2 emissions? Or do you just care about cluttering the beautiful country-side with wind turbines and solar panels?
@Bas
The Chancellor of Germany from 1998-2005 was Gerhard Schroeder. One month after he left office, he went to work for Gazprom. One of his main assignments was to lead the effort to complete the pipeline through the Baltic directly from Russia to Germany, bypassing the landlocked pipelines through Ukraine.
Interestingly enough, the Nord Stream pipes will carry almost exactly the amount of gas required to produce the same quantity of electricity each year as the 17 nuclear reactors that were operating in Germany before March 2011. The first stage of the pipe was completed and started making deliveries in late summer 2011, soon after the first 8 reactors were shut down.
Coincidence?
@Jeff,
Even your US company Sunpower delivers a performance guarantee for 25years with its PV-panels. So I do not know why you think those panels will stop shortly thereafter. Especially since those panels are rather simple chip technology.
UK tries to agree with a builder for a new NPP. EDF, the owner/utility, requires a price guarantee of ~$140/MWh during 25 years, otherwise no start.
Add to that the government granted liability subsidies of ~$50/MWh as well as some other subsidies.
Running period of the NPP: ~2023 – 2048
Present cost price of solar of ~$110/MWh.*)
Cost price of solar at start of the NPP $75/MWh.
Cost estimates for storage / back-up are in the range $30/MWh
So at the start of the NPP, solar is already substantially cheaper.
And all experts say that solar prices will continue downwards with 7%/year…
Wind prices go down too, but only 3% year.
So halfway the 25year of the NPP guaranteed price period solar price will be $70/MWh including back-up/storage/grid adaptations.
That is half the price of the NPP.
So I really do not see a positive business case for your NPP.
*) Notes:
– I used German prices.
– PV panels installations on your roof in the US cost ~50-100% more than in Germany, while using the same Chinese PV panels.
MIT did a short study regarding that enormous price difference (especially since hourly salary costs in US are less than in Germany).
Conclusions:
– cost of those Chinese panels are the same in Germany;
– US installers spend ~30% for promotion, German installers ~5%;
– In US lot of paperwork for license, etc. In Germany little.
– more economy-of-scale and efficiency in Germany
– ~30% unknown MIT suggested, may be more profit margins in US.
I assume that most of these extra costs will vanish if competition heats up and US governments & utilities strive to be less bureaucratic regarding those PV panels on your roof.
@Jeff,
Part of your arguments concern what could have been done with the money.
That is the past, nobody can change.
Suggest we discuss the best path forward, starting with the present situation and the future situation over 10 – 50 years. As NPP’s in US and EU have construction periods of ~10 years and operate on average ~40years.
@Rod
“…Schroeder …went to work for Gazprom … to lead the effort to complete the pipeline through the Baltic …
Yes that raised lots of thoughts, even in NL.
No doubts that the pipeline is necessary as:
– the quarrels between Ukraine and Russia created already a stop of the gas flow to Europe for several weeks (brought difficulties in Hungary, etc).
– the other pipeline goes through Belarus, and their dictator wanted to rise the transit tax substantially….
“…Nord Stream pipes will carry …the amount of gas required to produce the … electricity … the 17 nuclear reactors … pipe .. started making deliveries in late summer 2011, soon after the first 8 reactors were shut down…
Coincidence? …”
Sharp observation!
Considering:
– the turmoil in Germany after Fukushima (they still felt their suffering from Chernobyl)
– the falling polls for Merkel after she made the deal to postpone NPP’s closure for some years. So she was looking for an opportunity to turn that deal down.
– they had enough gas (most from our stock in the north of NL) for the existing gas plants
I do believe it is coincidence.
It may be possible that some had ideas to build new gas plants. But becoming more dependent on Russia is not a fine idea.
Anyway those who had these ideas were bypassed by the utilities, as those decided for the fluidized bed technology because that technology could also burn waste and biomass, and lignite is cheap in Germany.
While those plants can be up-/down-regulated fast (an absolute requirement for survival nowadays in Germany).
Furthermore waste and biomass burning plants have a better future in a Germany that generates all electricity by renewable.
Although some gas plants may also survive, if the electricity to gas conversion projects become a success.
@Bas
So I do not know why you think those panels will stop shortly thereafter. Especially since those panels are rather simple chip technology.
I wonder how many chips last 25 years, especially when purposely exposed to the material stresses caused by temperature variations over time in the most sunny locations possible.
@Bas
Anyway those who had these ideas were bypassed by the utilities, as those decided for the fluidized bed technology because that technology could also burn waste and biomass, and lignite is cheap in Germany.
What do you think the market for Russian gas would be in Germany if it had to compete with both nuclear and fluidized bed technology?
It is always beneficial for the profitability of commodity suppliers to force some of their competitors out of the market.
@Rod
“…What do you think the market for Russian gas would be in Germany…”
Heating houses and buildings. Almost all are heated by gas.
The volumes for that are far bigger than the volumes involved for gas burning power plants.
My wild guess is, that even if all electricity power plants in Germany would be gas burning plants, the volumes for heating houses are still bigger.
Furthermore; for cooking, gas is still the major choice (I had to overcome severe opposition from the women at home when I chose induction for my new house).
Especially in the north-east of Germany, you need to warm your house ~9month a year.
No BAS. Stop dodging the question and obfuscating the real issue.
Show me in the real world, where prices for the consumer have gone down after unreliables have been installed. Show me a place where prices didn’t go up substantially.
Show me!
You can quote bull$%&* prices all day long. I don’t care. We’re talking the real world.
And the past does matter. You can’t write it off, as “well that’s a might have been”. We must look at the past as guidance to what effects the same behaviour will have in the future.
The German’s actions DO NOT WORK in the real world. That’s a fact and it’s part of the past and part of the future.
Your postings are meaningless drivel, simply parroting crap you’ve read on the websites of liars. At first, the folks here patiently did you the favor of clearly demonstrating that you are wrong about everything and tried to educate you.
However, you’ve thrown that kind effort in the faces of people here, and now all you’re doing is vandalizing this website with lies.
You, BAS, are an information vandal. You’re no better than a delinquent with a can of spray paint.
@Jeff
The actual price consumers pay is highly political.
E.g. in NL we pay $286/Mwh as our government has a big tax, in order to stimulate that we save energy and to get money (otherwise they need to choose another tax).
But in Germany industry pays already substantial less due to renewable.
I quote: In fact, power prices for industry have been considerably lower in Germany than in neighboring France.”
It will still take some years before solar including storage & back-up, etc. will bring prices down for all consumers (not considering government tax, as those then may be raised in order to bring in more money).
I expect that situation ~2020.
Solar production costs reached grid parity in South Italy already.
@Bas
The price that industry pays is also “highly political”. Germany has a history of being a country whose people accept a close relationship between corporations and government in order to provide greater prosperity through massive exports.
On a world scale, it is impossible for all countries to be net exporters of manufactured products. (I sure hope no one asks for a source for that statement.)
Germany’s recent economic success is not scalable or even very repeatable.
@Rod
Agree:
– the industry price is also political
– it is impossible for all countries to be net exporters;
But your last position: “… Germany’s recent economic success is not scalable or even very repeatable..” generated discussions a few years ago and showed to be not tenable.
E.g. Denmark has also economic success (substantially more than NL while we do little regarding renewable) while it is far ahead of Germany regarding 100% renewable electricity.
Germany now generates ~22% with renewable, target for 2020; 35%
Denmark now generates ~45% with renewable (>30% wind), target for 2020 for wind alone is 50% (little solar due to its northern latitude).
Of course they use the pumped storage facilities of mostly Sweden.
The Danish are far more radical regarding renewable.
Wikipedia: “The installation of oil and gas heating is banned in newly constructed buildings from the start of 2013; beginning in 2016 this will also apply to existing buildings“!
Especially a variant of your position: “Germany thanks its success to the southern EU countries as those were willing to continue buying goods from Germany and take big risks with high budget deficits… So Germany should give more money to Greece/Spain/Portugal…” was debated.
But that position did not survive when the real figures came up. E.g:
– Greece is not competitive at all, even not now (consumptions on Greece pavements are still more expensive than in Germany);
– German export to Far East rose greatly, while those to Greece went down.
One of the often quoted factors in Germany’s success is the volume of employment renewable generates (~300,000 jobs, while nuclear ~6,000).
I’m not sure how to think about that.
But I agree with other factors:
– less import of energy (fuels), so good for the balance of payments
– more export as Germany is ahead with renewable technology and other countries eager to follow, will import that technology.
That certainly is a factor with Denmark. Danish wind mills took over the world, even China and here in NL (we only make the rotor blades as those become ever more complicated/difficult high tech).
@ Benjamin,
Uranium depletable ?
The sun will shine for 4 billion years or so and it is called renewable.
We have supplies of fissile material (Uranium & Thorium) for at least 6 billion years.
Who’s renewable now ?
In other words, you insist that we should use something that does not produce real energy… and is not projected to for AT LEAST 30 years.
The Chinese started back in 2010. Even if the USA started now, the project would still be done decades ahead of anything coming out of ITER.
Plenty of other things can be, if fanatics like you will just get out of the way.
Including the cost of seasonal storage so that your car can push through the snow and yoru house is warm and bright for the party on New Year’s Eve? Don’t make me laugh.