In Germany, Idiot Greens are the Problem

Below are excerpts from a Der Spiegel Online interview with Stephan Kohler, head of the German Energy Agency. Herr Kohler is incredibly kind and courteous to two very poorly prepared journalists, who clearly have no idea of how their electrical power grid works. (Go here for full interview)

In Germany, 75 percent of electricity goes to industry, for which a secure supply -- that is, at every second, and with constant voltage -- is indispensable. Neither solar nor wind power are suitable for that purpose today. Both fluctuate and provide either no secure supply or only a small fraction of a secure supply. _Spiegel

Kohler is patiently explaining to the uninformed journalists how sensitive German industry is to large intermittent fluctuations in their power supply. In fact, Germany is losing industries at an increasing rate due to its inability to guarantee reliable, high quality power at reasonable rates -- thanks to dysfunctional green government mandates and the imbecilic shutting down of nuclear power plants.

Kohler continues discussing some of the problems with intermittency:

... a surplus and fluctuations lead to very unpleasant systemic effects. We have voltage fluctuations within the grid that create problems for industry. Or we overload the grids in neighboring countries. Poland is in the process of installing technical equipment to protect its grids by keeping out surplus German electricity.

...Today anyone can build a solar power system wherever he wants. And anyone who owns one of these systems also has the right to be connected to the grid operator. Just take a drive through Bavaria, and you'll see entire fields full of solar power plants, even though there is zero consumption there and there is no grid. Solar systems should be expanded only in places where the electricity is needed and there are grids that can absorb it...

... Nowadays wind energy is mostly generated where it isn't needed, that is, in the north. But the power lines that are supposed to carry this electricity to the south only exist on paper at the moment. I would propose that we permit the construction of more wind farms only once the power lines have actually been built...

...So far the expansion of power lines has often been blocked by objections from the environmental movement, that is, the people who staunchly promote the development of renewal energy. When things go wrong, they give themselves an environmental halo and blame the grid operators....

... Every new solar or wind energy system that we cannot integrate in a way that makes sense has a negative impact on the system, both economically and technically.

... _Spiegel

Unfortunately, there is no clean way of integrating large scale wind and solar energy into a modern industrial power grid. The longer German greens persist in their idiotic Energiewende, the more ruinously expensive it will be for Germany to dig its way out of the deep green hole.

And since Germany is at the centre of the European power grid (and the European economy), when Germany suffers, all of Europe will suffer.