Germany’s fixation on subsidised wind and solar gave rise to the destruction of its once enviable nuclear power generation capacity.
The so-called wind and solar transition aka the ‘Energiewende’ has been an unmitigated disaster, with perfectly avoidable and perfectly predictable power rationing and crushing power prices driving German manufacturing industries and businesses to the wall.
Having killed off reliable nuclear power, Germans are literally scrambling for electricity; drawing coal-fired power from Poland and nuclear power from France every time they suffer a burst of calm, cloudy weather – or ‘dunkelflaute’.
Those fretting about where their power might come from and carbon dioxide gas have coalesced around the concept of restoring Germany’s nuclear power generation capacity.
STT support nuclear power simply because it works. That it wedges climate zealots in the bargain, is simply an added feature.
Ross Poimeroy makes the point below that if Germany wants Co2 emissions free power, around-the-clock, whatever the weather there really is only one solution: nuclear power.
Now many of our followers will take issue with Ross – who claims that carbon dioxide gas is “pollution”. Evidently Ross must have skipped his high school science lesson on photosynthesis and how essential CO2 is to every living thing on this planet.
But, that aside, his criticism of the destruction of Germany’s nuclear power generation fleet is entirely justified.
Germany’s Disastrous Switch Away From Nuclear Power
Real Clear Science
Ross Poimeroy
27 August 2024
At the dawn of the millennium, Germany launched an ambitious plan to transition to renewable energy. “Die Energiewende” initiated a massive expansion of solar and wind power, resulting in a commendable 25 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2022 compared to 2002.
But while Energiewende slashed pollution through building out renewable energy sources, it also phased out Germany’s fleet of safe, carbon-free nuclear power plants, a longtime goal of environmental activists afraid of nuclear’s salient – but in actuality small – dangers. The result, according to a new analysis recently published to the International Journal of Sustainable Energy, has been a boondoggle for consumers and for the environment.
In 2002, nuclear power supplied about a fifth of Germany’s electricity. Twenty-one years later, it supplied none. A layperson might think that cheap wind and solar could simply fill the gap, but it isn’t so simple. Once up and running, nuclear reactors provide reliable, affordable “baseload” power – electricity that’s available all the time. Ephemeral renewables simply can’t match nuclear’s consistency. And since an advanced economy like Germany’s requires a 100 percent reliable power grid, fossil fuel power plants burning coal and natural gas were brought online to pick up wind and solar’s slack.
The net result of German politicians’ shortsightedness in phasing out nuclear power is a vastly pricier grid. The new analysis shows that if Germans simply maintained their 2002 fleet of reactors through 2022, they could have saved themselves roughly $600 billion Euros. Why so much? Well, in addition to their construction costs, renewables required expensive grid upgrades and subsidies. Moreover, in this hypothetical scenario where nuclear remained, Germany enjoyed nearly identical reductions in carbon emissions.
Jan Emblemsvåg, a Professor of Civil Engineering at Norway’s NTNU and the architect of the analysis, imagined another scenario out of curiosity. What if the Germans had taken the money spent on expanding renewables and instead used it to construct new nuclear capacity? According to his calculations, they could have slashed carbon emissions a further 73% on top of their cuts in 2022, while simultaneously enjoying a savings of 330 billion Euros compared to the massive costs of Energiewende.
Policymakers in other countries looking to decarbonize their grids should take note.
Real Clear Science
STOP THESE THINGS 
In pretty much every single case, money squandered on wind/solar installations would have been better and more effectively spent on new nuclear generation capacity.
How is increasing CO2 concentration from 350 ppm in 1750 to 415 today going to cause a runaway greenhouse? After all, 150 million years ago, CO2 concentration was 2,500 ppm, and the Earth is still here. What happened to all that CO2? Marine plants and creatures combine it with calcium to create bones and teeth and armor. When they die, they sink to the oceans’ bottoms and become permanent limestone (calcium carbonate).
CO2 concentration has been declining on an almost straight-line trajectory from 2,500 ppm 150 million years ago. It dropped below 180 ppm during the last six glaciations. When it drops below 150 ppm, plants start to die, and then so does everything else except maybe bacteria, viruses, and maybe some fungi.
At the rate it had been progressing, Gaia’s suicide would gave been complete in about eight million years. Fortunately, humanity intervened in the form of the Industrial Age to postpone her suicide until about eighteen million years. If we really care about the long-term prospects for life on Earth, we should be burning hydrocarbons and making cement as fast as we can.
Details and more in my book “Where Will We Get Our Energy?” Everything quantified. No vague handwaving. 350 bibliographic citations so you can check that I didn’t just make up stuff.