German wind energy 2012: No increase in wind energy production despite 1000 new wind turbines

A sudden outburst of honesty by a representative of the German wind energy industry:

But despite the increase in the number of units (1000 new units, NNoN), the amount of electricity they contributed to the grid merely remained stable. According to Sylvia Pilarsky-Grosch, vice president of the German Wind Energy Association, "We didn't produce more electricity in 2012 with wind energy than we did in 2011." And one of the reasons for that was that there simply wasn't enough wind.

Yes indeed, when the wind does not blow, neither German, nor any other  wind turbines produce energy. And when the sun does not shine, not even the most expensive solar panels add energy to the grid. 

So much for the reliability of these renewable sources of energy. 

Germany on its way to become the country with the highest energy prices

Germany is well on its way to become the country with the highest energy prices in Europe. 
The senseless energy transition policy, favoring subsidized, unreliable and ineffective wind and solar power, is making Germany dependent on expensive Russian gas, and now also overpriced Norwegian hydro power:

Germany and Norway have signed a contract for a high-voltage undersea cable aimed at exchanging surplus renewable energy. The project is essential for Germany's plan to phase out nuclear power by 2022.

Construction of the North Sea underwater cable would cost between 1.5 billion and 2 billion euros ($2-2.6 billion), and is expected to be finished by 2018, Germany's state-owned KfW development bank announced Tuesday.

"This project is a major step toward the integration of German wind power in the country's energy grid, and a cornerstone of Germany's shift toward renewable energy generation," TenneT Chief Executive Martin Fuchs said.

The North Sea cable is scheduled to boast a capacity of 1,400 megawatts - the equivalent of a larger plant. It is intended to transport Norwegian hydropower to Germany in times of low wind and solar supply. Furthermore, the country's excess power from renewable sources is meant to be transported to Norway to be stored there in dams for later use back in Germany.

Denmark is already doing what Germany intends to do:

Windy Denmark is able to shift nighttime energy resources for daytime use, while Norway -- which gets almost all its electricity from conventional hydropower -- has reservoirs behind its dams that can easily store that excess power. The arrangement helps Norway mitigate some of the risk from drought and other challenges to its hydro-heavy grid, Miller said.

For Norwegians, the system is a great money-maker as well. They pay their neighbor almost nothing for the nighttime wind energy they take on since demand is so low at that time, but charge Denmark a premium for it at peak pricing hours.

"Norway is making a killing," Miller said. "Danish people pay the highest power prices in Europe."

Energy prices have already risen steeply in Germany creating huge problems for consumers and companies. But that is only the beginning. Wait until the Norwegian energy barons begin to "make a killing"!

The conversion of a believer in "green jobs"

Deborah Sloan is a mechanical engineer and researcher, who after completing her Masters degree in Mechanical Engineering at Stanford took a "Green Job" with a solar company because believed its potential to create clean and cheaper energy. However, soon she found out that the "green" reality was quite different from the "green" dream: 

Mitt Romney has recently taken fire not only from the Obama campaign but even from some left-leaning Republicans, for his rightful criticism of Obama’s destructive “green jobs” programs.  Not only is Mr. Romney right to criticize these programs -- and his position supported by many economic studies -- but in fact the situation is even worse than anything suggested by these criticisms. Green jobs are destroying the abilities and spirits of a whole generation of engineers. I should know. I was one of those engineers.

In 2008 I completed my Masters in Mechanical Engineering at Stanford and took a “Green Job” with a solar company. Excitingly, it seemed to match the green rhetoric--to have potential to create the incredible value of cleaner, cheaper energy.

Unfortunately, the more I learned about my job and industry, the more I realized they were fundamentally flawed.

Management said we would be competitive with oil and gas once we manufactured panels for $1.00/watt. But as a mechanical engineer, I learned most of solar’s cost is not panels themselves but “balance of system” (BOS) components like DC to AC converters, wiring, and structural mounting, adding about $3.00/watt for a best-case and typically around $4.00/watt. Coal and hydroelectric systems cost as low as $2.10/watt and $1.00/watt, respectively. Ifound no evidence that solar’s BOS costs would decrease meaningfully.

Nor did anyone have a solution to the problem that has plagued solar and wind energy since their inception: intermittency. Solar and wind energy come intermittently, with no means to store it for later use that wouldn’t add considerably to their already-high cost. Thus, the idea of a large scale solar and wind economy is farcical.

If the industry was fundamentally unproductive, so were my colleagues and I. We were wasting a tragic amount of time, talent--and other people's money--making a far inferior form of power when we could have been creating real advances in other, legitimate kinds of energy.

Just as disturbing was what these “jobs” did to people’s spirits. Every high-ranking person in solar or wind must eventually figure out, as I did, that he cannot compete in the market, that his competitive advantages are government subsidies and forced limitations on competitors.

Whatever technical advances we made didn’t solve the intractable problems, so our real victories came in forms such as the Cap and Trade Bill. I learned of the bill’s passage in the House of Representatives while driving home from a day spent on an interesting technical project. I knew my work was trivial in comparison. Our true means of revenue-generation was forcibly limiting carbon emissions, to force consumers into using energy sources like ours.

I had looked forward to beating the competition, but with superior products--and working even harder if we should lose, or if that failed, joining the competition in creating a more energy-rich world. When the goal is not out-producing but crippling of the competition, the goodwill of "May the best man win" becomes "What kills them can only make me stronger."

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Real wealth and jobs are not produced by means of subsidies extracted by force from helpless victims by the Obama administration, but by rational free people acting under their own initiative.  The sooner the government stops forcing green jobs on us, the sooner the rest of America’s wasted green workforce can join me in getting real jobs.

Read the entire article here

Greenpeace: "We don´t need such a huge amount of gas and certainly not cheap gas"

The shale gas revolution has been a game changer in the U.S. It could give an enormous boost also to Europe (which is heading for another deep recession). But that is exactly what the enviro-fundamenalist alarmists, who have hijacked the entire debate in Europe, want to prevent:  

Unless carbon capture and storage can be developed on a commercial scale, that means gas as a fuel has a limited future and should not be invested in too heavily, environmental campaigners say.

They are especially against shale gas, whose environmental credentials are questioned in Europe.

"We need natural gas as a transition fuel. However, we don't need such a huge amount of gas and certainly not cheap gas, because that would kick out not just coal, but also renewables," Greenpeace renewable energy director Sven Teske said.

Read the entire article here

Cheap and clean energy, like shale gas is anathema to "green" fanatics like Teske. These people prefer expensive Russian gas, or even "dirty" coal, rather than "American" unconventional gas, as long as they help to maintain the taxpayer funded huge subsidies for senseless "renewable" wind and solar energy. 

Meet U.S. Navy´s awesome new SMV (made in China): Keeps "our fleet ready"

"In a rather practical design feature, each of this electric maintenance vehicles is also equipped with a roof-mounted solar panel"
(image by US Navy)

Meet the U.S. Navy´s awesome new weapon, the SMV (SlowMoving Vehicle) made in China (chassis)! 

With a range of 40 miles and maximum speed of 25 mph the SMV is according to U.S. Navy Captain John Coronado "perfect for commuting in and around JBPHH, transporting people, tools, and supplies to keep our fleet ready”: 

PEARL HARBOR – Naval Facilities Engineering Command (NAVFAC) Hawaii, Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam’s (JBPHH) installation transportation manager, officially added 36 electric SlowMoving Vehicles (SMVs) to its inventory July 30.

“These SMVs offer a safer and smarter alternative to the smaller, outdated neighborhood electric vehicles that have been in use for the past 10 years,” said Capt. John Coronado, NAVFAC Hawaii commanding officer. “A range of 40 miles and maximum speed of 25 mph make them perfect forcommuting in and around JBPHH, transporting people, tools, and supplies to keep our fleet ready.”  

The models, manufactured by Vantage Vehicle International, Inc., include two- and four-passenger trucks and cargo vans and have virtually the same capability as full-size automobiles. They also have hard doors, windshield wipers, air conditioning/heat, radio, and instrument gauges, which other SMVs do not. Vantage SMVs use conventional 110-volt charging cables; however, each one is also equipped with a roof-mounted solar panel to reduce time and resources at the charging station, while extending battery life and usage.

Distribution of the new vehicles will first be to commands that already have SMVs and power stations in place. NAVFAC Hawaii plans to purchase more vehicles in the future to keep up with the President’s fossil fuel reduction mandate. 

Read the entire US Navy press release here

We are all waiting for the next step. Maybe a solar powered aircraft carrier?

PS
Capt. Coronado forgot to mention perhaps the most useful feature of the new SMV:  It is ideal for noiseless transportation to and from the Hickam Officers’ Club, particularly at very late/early hours. 

The shale gas revolution: China begins to see the light

China, the world's biggest energy user, is also one of the nations with the largest reserves of shale gas. According to government estimates, China has explorable shale gas reserves of about 25.1 trillion cubic meters, which on paper means that based on current gas consumption, there are enough gas stocks to last for the next two centuries.

China Daily

China is beginning to understand the blessings of shale gas: 

There is now a growing urgency in Beijing to further encourage the development of unconventional energy sources as it believes such steps are essential to help reduce carbon emissions and costly gas imports.

Shale gas remains an integral part of the overall energy strategy and the government has outlined a plan that will see China producing 60 to 100 billion cubic meters of natural gas annually by 2020 from shale sources.

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Natural gas is the practical solution to China's long-term energy requirements, as other unconventional sources like wind and solar power have proved to be expensive propositions, Chen says.

Though China has the largest installed capacity in wind turbines and is the largest maker of solar panels in the world, it is not safe for the energy-hungry nation to solely focus on renewable energies, experts say.

Energy demand is expected to jump sharply by 2030, when China becomes the largest economy in the world, experts say. According to the BP Energy Outlook 2030 released in January, China's energy consumption in 2030 will be more than the combined demand of the US and Europe.

During the same period the energy deficit between China's own production and consumption is expected to jump six-fold over that of 2010, according to the report. China already imports more than 55 percent of its oil requirements and 20 percent of its natural gas requirements. The over-reliance on costly fuel imports will impact long-term growth and development prospects, experts say.

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"There is no country in the world that wants to be reliant on other nations for energy supplies. The reasons for this are both economical and political," says Howard Rogers, director of the Natural Gas Research Programme at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies in Oxford, United Kingdom.

Expensive energy imports put nations in a vulnerable position, especially when there is political turbulence across the world, says Youn-kyoo Kim, associate professor of International Studies at the Seoul-based Hanyang University in South Korea.

"The US success in shale gas has already made it less reliant on imports from the Middle East. Like the US, if China achieves a shale gas revolution it will also be less reliant on costly gas imports from Russia and the Middle East. It could also pave the way for a new cooperation mechanism in Northeast Asia," Kim says.

The shale gas revolution has helped the US to become the leading nation in terms of natural gas stocks and also cut its oil imports from 60 percent of total consumption in 2005 to 46 percent. Over the next five years, the US is also set to be a leading exporter of natural gas.

"I think China is very impressed by what has happened in the US shale sector and would like to replicate that success. However, I think it will be some time before China can achieve significant volumes of shale gas output," says Rogers from the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies.

Read the entire article here

PS

China´s intention to dramatically intensify shale gas exploration is of course bad news for Putin and Gazprom. The Russian energy giant will not be able to sell as much gas to its eastern neighbor as it had hoped to do. 

And by the way, Oxford´s Rogers is probably not entirely right when saying that "no country in the world wants to be reliant on other nations for energy supplies". Germany for example appears to favor a policy that makes it reliant on Russian energy supplies.

Germany: Solar energy "threatening to become the costliest mistake in the history of German energy policy"

German Der Spiegel reports about one of the greatest failures of Angela Merkel´s government - the disastrous and costly solar energy policy:

A new study by Georg Erdmann, professor of energy systems at Berlin's Technical University, reveals just how far Germany's current center-right governing coalition -- made up of Chancellor Angela Merkel's CDU and the business-friendly Free Democrats (FDP) -- has strayed from its own self-imposed goals. Erdmann has calculated the effects that the latest changes to the EEG (Renewable Energy Sources Act, NNoN) will have between now and 2030. He believes that subsidies for renewable energy, including an expansion of the power grid, will saddle energy consumers with costs well over €300 billion ($377 billion). 

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Photovoltaics are threatening to become the costliest mistake in the history of German energy policy. Photovoltaic power plant operators and homeowners with solar panels on their rooftops are expected to pocket around €9 billion ($11.3 billion) this year, yet they contribute barely 4 percent of the country's power supply, and only erratically at that.

When night falls, all solar modules go offline in one fell swoop; in the winter, they barely generate power during the daytime. During the summer, meanwhile, they sometimes generate too much power around midday, without enough storage capacity to capture it all. The distribution network is also not laid out in a way that would allow the country's thousands of owners of photovoltaic arrays -- a term used to denote an installation of several panels working together -- to feed into the grid as well as draw power from it.

To keep the lights on, Germany ends up importing nuclear power from France and the Czech Republic. Grid operator Tennet even resorted to tapping an aging fossil fuel-fired power plant in Austria to compensate for shortages in solar power.

Lobbyists for the solar industry like to impress the public with big numbers concerning their products' theoretical capabilities. And it's true that all currently installed photovoltaic arrays, theoretically, add up to more than 25 gigawatts of capacity, easily double the power generated by all nuclear power plants still operating in Germany.
Unfortunately, solar arrays provide peak performance only with maximum light exposure when the sun is at the perfect vertical angle and the modules at the ideal temperature -- in other words, under laboratory conditions. In reality, all of Germany's photovoltaic arrays together generate less power than two nuclear reactors. And they can't even replace those reactors unless they have enough storage capacity available. The figures on peak performance of photovoltaic arrays lead to misunderstandings, the German Physical Society writes in an expert opinion, stating, "Photovoltaics are fundamentally incapable of replacing any other type of power plant." Essentially, every solar array must be backed up with a conventional power plant as a reserve, creating an expensive double infrastructure.


So far the powerful  wind and solar energy lobby has got almost everything it has demanded from Merkel´s weak government, but when the German economic engine begins to stall - and there are already signs of it happening - then whoever is in charge at the time will have to make huge changes in the country´s energy policy. 

Game over for wind and solar power

Even the most die-hard propagandists of wind and solar energy, like the UN International Renewable Energy Agency (Irena), are now forced to admit that the the American led shale gas revolution is a gamechanger. An interview with Dolf Gielen, the director of Irena's Innovation and Technology Centre in Bonn, is quite revealing: 

• The question today is whether the arrival of cheaper hydrocarbons, in the form of shale gas, could also spell the end of renewable energy as a major player.
• The arrival of vast quantities of previously inaccessible hydrocarbons has driven down the price of natural gas in the US from its 2003 peak of US$20 per million British thermal units to today's $2.
• The solar manufacturing industry that has undergone rounds of bankruptcies and consolidation over the past year seems to have finally bottomed out. "We've reached a situation where most of the solar cell and module manufacturers are making losses," said Mr Gielen. 
• Already, the global economic crisis has pushed nations such as Spain and the Czech Republic to roll back subsidies that made the costs of green power more equal to fossil fuels and motivated homeowners to pitch solar panels on their roofs." (the bolded text is of course sheer propaganda, NNoN)
• "... in the long term, the failure of nations to come to a meaningful climate change agreement to curb greenhouse-gas emissions has sapped confidence in cap-and-trade carbon markets and investor appetite for projects from carbon burial to nuclear to solar."

Still these solar and wind energy propagandists cling to futile hopes about some kind of a miracle - which will not happen - for wind and solar energy after 2030:

Continued low prices pose a threat to the pace of growth for wind and solar energy, at least until 2030, according to the International Renewable Energy Agency (Irena), a United Nations agency with headquarters in Bonn, Germany, and Abu Dhabi.

In power generation, renewables account for a little more than 20 per cent of the world capacity, and Mr Gielen forecasts that will rise to 50 per cent with new hydropower, wind and solar plants that are becoming increasingly cost competitive.

It is highly unlikely that renewables - even if they would include hydropower - will rise to the 50% in the foreseeable future, when one considers the abundance of shale and conventional oil and gas available. And even the 20% capacity claim for today is misleading. If one looks at the global energy consumtion figures -  as opposed to capacity - the share of hydro, wind, geothermal, woodpellet, biofuel and biogas declines to just about 8%:

It is crucial, at this point, to differentiate between the installed capacity of renewables and the actual share of renewables satisfying the final energy consumption.

Substracting the use of traditional biomass, the figure for renewables in the modern sense, that is, wind, hydro, solar, geothermal, woodpellet, biofuel and biogas declines to 8.2% of the entire global energy consumption.

And of this 8,2% only a fraction comes from wind, solar and bioenergy. Their share might have grown somewhat during the last couple of years, but this figure from the Danish Risø National Laboratory for Sustainable Energy from 2009 still shows the reality behind all the hype: 

Only 1% of the world’s energy consumption comes from modern renewable energy technologies such as wind, solar and bioenergy. 

Dutch professors solve the euro crisis: "Get rid of those debts with sun and wind"

The eurozone is on the brink, with Spain now asking for bail-out money. But no reason to worry. A group of Dutch professors know how to solve the euro crisis

The countries most affected by the Eurocrisis could reduce their debts substantially with concessions for renewable energy. Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Ireland have excellent conditions for harvesting energy from the solar energy, wind power and geothermal energy sources. They could give their creditors concessions for large scale investment programs in renewable energy that offer enough long-term financial profit.

This 'renewable-energy-concessions-for-debt-reduction-plan' was introduced by a group of renowned economics and energy professors and proposed in the Dutch daily 'NRC Handelsblad' last Monday. A thirty percent debt reduction is possible if Ireland gives less than one percent, Portugal about one percent and Greece about two percent of its total surface into concession for renewable energy production. The authors emphasize that 'the energy projects don't have to exclusively be large-scale and on a few big pieces of land. They could capitalize on vast opportunities for decentralized energy locally as well'.

The involved countries would be able to pay off a substantial part of their debts to the creditors and at the same time they will also receive a positive stimulus for their economy and employment from the construction and maintenance of the projects. 'Especially the young generation in these countries who now face a tremendously high unemployment rate will enjoy a new perspective for a debt-free future with many opportunities for healthy growth. And Europe will have more renewable energy with which to contribute to a cleaner, healthier and safer environment for its citizens', according to the professors.

The professors have obviously not noticed that governments in a number of countries have been forced to cut  the subsidies to ineffecient, unreliable and expensive wind and solar energy projects:

This plan only has winners. The concessions allow the creditors to get their money back, which is quite uncertain in the current situation. The indebted countries will not only be paying off a substantial part of their debts, but they will also receive a positive stimulus for their economy and employment from the construction and maintenance of the projects. Especially the young generation in these countries who now face a tremendously high unemployment rate will enjoy a new perspective for a debt-free future with many opportunities for healthy growth. And Europe will have more renewable energy with which to contribute to a cleaner, healthier and safer environment for its citizens.

Source: this opinion article was published in NRC Handelsblad (The Netherlands) on June 4th by Prof. Dr. Klaas van Egmond (Professor in Geosciences – Utrecht University), Prof. Dr. Sylvester Eijffinger (Professor Financial Economy – Tilburg University), Prof. Dr. Herman Wijffels (Professor Sustainablity and Societal Change – Utrecht University), Prof.  Dr. Wim Sinke (Professor Sustainable Energysystems – Utrecht University) en Marco Witschge (initiator of this article and Director of the New Energy for The Netherlands Foundation)

Read the entire article here

One´s first reaction when reading the Dutch academics´ article is that this must be a joke. But regrettably these professors appear to be serious when they suggest that huge investments in solar and wind energy could solve the eurozone crisis. How detached from reality can you be as a Dutch academic?

"Green" energy hoax exposed

Marty Sieff exposes the the phantasies of "green" energy:

Understand this: the technology to store solar energy on a gigawatt (billion watts of power) scale does not yet exist. If you want it to, invent it. But to imagine that it does exist is to indulge in science fiction.
The energy output of a single medium-size coal mine in Kentucky, Robert Bryce writes, is greater than the entire solar and wind energy output of the United States.

This is not because some mythical evil oil and nuclear corporation executives have plotted to sabotage virtuous “clean” and renewable wind and solar power. It is because wind and solar power do not work. Wind power never will. Solar power may fifty or a hundred years from now. But right now, to bet on wind and solar power to run the US economy is ludicrous. It is science fiction.
And to dream that hydroelectric power, biomass, or thermal power can make the American people energy-independent is worse than science fiction; it is a fairy tale for babies.
--

Wind energy is never going to be more than a marginal energy source. That is because, quite simply, it depends on the wind. Electrical generating stations need to have regular, sustainable sources of energy their machinery can constantly rely upon. Storage batteries and technology to store wind energy do not exist. Hopefully, one day soon they will. But we simply cannot count on it.
Also, as Robert Bryce, the managing editor of Energy Tribune, has pointed out, the most effective wind turbines require major quantities of the extremely rare minerals or rare earths lithium and lanthanides. “That means mining,” Bryce writes in his book Power Hungry. “And China controls nearly all of the world’s existing mines that produce lanthanides.”
In other words, when Thomas Friedman is telling us to embrace a wind energy future, he is not making us less energy-dependent on the Middle East, he is making us far more energy-dependent on China.


Read the entire article here

The question to ask is why so many "progressive" and leftist - and even a number of conservative - politicians continue to praise "green" energy, even if most of them understand, or at least should understand, that solar and wind power are no solution to our present - or foreseeable future - energy needs. We in Europe have reason to envy the United Sates, where the overwhelming majority of leading Republican politicians dare to oppose the politically correct enviro-fundamentalist agenda, dictated by the greenies and their supporters in the media.

Merkel´s energy transition: Energy prices now so high that low-income Germans not able to pay

"The primary reason for these costs can be seen on rooftops throughout Germany" 

The sad truth about German chancellor Angela Merkel´s failed energy transition policy is becoming more and more evident. Subsidised wind and solar power production has led to higher energy prices that low-income and unemployed Germans are not able to pay anymore. And further increases are in the pipeline ...

More than a year has passed since the Fukushima nuclear reactor disaster in Japan prompted Germany's lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, to vote to gradually phase out the country's nuclear power plants, replacing them wherever possible with renewable energy sources. Yet it is only now that a serious discussion is beginning over the costs of the nuclear phase-out.

Chancellor Angela Merkel made the transition to renewable energy a top priority after dismissing her environment minister, Norbert Röttgen, last month, but essential questions remain unanswered. Who will pay for this supposed "joint effort," in Merkel's words? What's the upper limit on costs? And when will voters' positive view of the nuclear phase-out give way to frustration over rising costs?

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Rising energy costs are especially embarrassing for German leaders because, until very recently, they claimed to have everything under control. Merkel more or less offered a price guarantee in a speech on the energy turnaround she gave in front of the Bundestag last year.
"We must continue to provide both businesses and individual citizens with affordable energy," Merkel said at the time. "The costs to consumers as a result of the EEG must not exceed their current level."
That's a promise the chancellor won't be able to keep. This fall, the Federal Network Agency is expected to announce rates that are 30 to 50 percent higher than current levels, putting consumers' contribution to renewable energy subsidies between 4.7 and 5.3 euro cents per kilowatt hour of energy, plus sales tax, up from the current level of 3.59 cents. Bareiss, the CDU's energy specialist, has even talked of "potentially more than six cents" per kilowatt hour, which would be an increase of nearly 70 percent.
The primary reason for these costs can be seen on rooftops throughout Germany. Energy consumers will pay €100 billion over the next 20 years to subsidize photovoltaics installed before the end of 2011. The first several months of this year added at least €5 billion to that amount.

Meanwhile, many low-income and unemployed Germans have reached the limits of what they're able to pay, as the example of Aminta Seck in Berlin shows. As a single mother, Seck receives €860 a month in government assistance. By law, €40 of that amount is intended primarily to cover energy costs.
In reality, though, the money isn't enough. Despite moving out of her old apartment and into a smaller one, Seck consistently comes up a few euros short each month, an amount she then has to pay as a lump sum at the end of the year. "I manage to come up with the money for the energy bill in the summer," she says, "but in the winter, when it's dark, it's just not possible."
Once the electricity has been shut off, it's difficult for consumers to climb out from under their debts, since in addition to settling their overdue bills, they have to pay a fee of up to €80 to have the power turned back on.

"My clients end up waiting at least a week, and in extreme cases even up to two months," says social worker Renate Stark, who works in Prenzlauer Berg at Caritas, a social services organization, and counsels people who have fallen behind on their energy bills.
Stark says she's already seen the effects of the transition to renewable energy sources. "In the past, at most one client per month came to me because of problems paying energy bills," she says. "Now it's at least 30."
This makes it all the more astonishing how casually politicians -- from all parties -- have disregarded the societal consequences of their project. While the government and opposition quarreled for months over a few euros' difference in Hartz IV payments, they essentially formed a grand coalition when it came to subsidizing solar panels.


Read the entire article here

Jimmy Carter predicted the failure of solar power already in 1979

Former president Jimmy Carter does not always get the credit he deserves for some of the predictions he made during his brief tenure as US president. Carter  e.g. already in 1979 foresaw the future for the solar panels he had installed on the White House roof:  

Carter predicted that “a generation from now, this solar heater can either be a curiosity, a museum piece, an example of a road not taken, or it can be a small part of one of the greatest and most exciting adventures ever undertaken by the American people

It turned out that Carter was spot on, with regard to the first alternative in his prediction: 

The Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History recently accepted a solar panel that was once installed on the White House. The panel was donated by Unity College in Unity, Maine, during a ceremony July 21. 

“Solar America,” an initiative undertaken by President Jimmy Carter’s administration, was established three decades ago. On June 30, 1979, 32 solar panels were installed on the roof of the White House above the Oval Office to heat water in the staff kitchen, which was often used by President Carter. The panels were removed in 1986 during the Reagan Presidency

The National Museum of American History press release, August 18, 2009

Fortunately, Carter´s successor Ronald Reagan had his priorities right also on this matter: 

President Ronald Reagan took office in 1981, and one of his first moves was to order the solar panels removed. It was clear Reagan had a completely different take on energy consumption. "Reagan's political philosophy viewed the free market as the best arbiter of what was good for the country. Corporate self-interest, he felt, would steer the country in the right direction," the author Natalie Goldstein wrote in "Global Warming." 

George Charles Szego, the engineer who persuaded Carter to install the solar panels, reportedly claimed that Reagan Chief of Staff Donald T. Regan "felt that the equipment was just a joke, and he had it taken down." The panels were removed in 1986 when work was being done on the White House roof below the panels. 

PS

Already in the fall of 2010 the Obama administration promised to install new solar panels on the White House roof. But now, almost two years later, there are still no solar panels there ...

On the other hand, one cannot blame Obama for wanting to avoid calling into mind a president who was voted out of the office after just one term ....

And in general, during an election year Obama hardly wishes to be associated with one of the greatest energy failures of our time. 

Italy latest country to cut "incentives" to solar power

The same story everywhere: When governments cut "incentives" (read tax credits and subsidies) to solar power, the market quickly disappears. Now it is the Italian government, which has realized that heavily burden electricity consumers are not what is needed in these times of economic crisis:

Growth of solar power capacity in Italy, the world's second-biggest market, is expected to slow to 1,500-2,500 megawatts in 2012 after a 9,300 MW leap in 2011, due to a planned cut in incentives, a senior industry official said.
"It could be between 1,500 and 2,500 megawatts," Gerardo Montanino, director of operating division at GSE, Italy's green energy incentives management agency, said on the sidelines of a photovoltaic conference in northern Italy on Tuesday.
"It is very difficult to make more precise forecasts when the rules for the sector are changing," Montanino said.


The Italian government has announced a plan to scale back production incentives to the photovoltaic and other renewable energy this year to ease the burden on consumers, who pay for the industry support with their power bills.
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A sharp fall in Italy's solar growth is bad news for major solar equipment makers such as Chinese group Suntech Power Holdings, Trina Solar, Yingli Green Energy Holding and U.S. firms First Solar and SunPower Corp.
--

Italian makers of solar power equipment, like their western peers, have been hit hard in the past couple of years by the growing competition from lower cost Asian rivals and may turn to the European Commission for help, the head of Italian PV industry association Comitato IFI said.
"We are considering whether to ask the European Commission to launch an anti-dumping action," Comitato IFI Chairman Alessandro Cremonesi told Reuters.
"But it is a very long process ... it would take at least two years, and the industry cannot wait 24 months," Cremonesi said.


Read the entire article here

The solar bubble bursts - also in the UK

Solar power is in steep decline, also in the UK:


Solar panel installations have fallen by almost 90% in the weeks since the government halved cut the subsidy available, according to Department of Energy and Climate Change figures.


The UK figures should not come as a surprise to anybody. They just confirm what has been known for long: When Green taxes and subsidies are cut, the renewables die. 


The solar industry is in a global decline as governments have cut taxes and subsidies. This is a sound development:  The sooner we get rid of the "green" solar bubble, the better. 


There is more than enough of affordable and dependable energy  available - e.g. conventional and unconventional gas and oil - for future needs, both in the UK and elsewhere. That is also where the real jobs are. 

The German solar power industry is wiped out

The sun is setting on the German solar power industry:


The global solar industry has entered a brutal phase of consolidation and nowhere are the effects as dramatic as in eastern Germany. Several companies have already declared bankruptcy, leaving towns and cities in the region struggling with job losses and tax revenue shortfalls. The future bodes ill.


The sun, it was said, was going to save Frankfurt an der Oder, a city of 60,000 on the Polish border. After years of post-reunification economic doldrums, whose nadir came with the 2003 failure of a much-ballyhooed microchip factory project, the burgeoning German solar industry took an interest in the down-on-its-luck city.

In 2006, solar-panel manufacturer Conergy moved into the never-used computer chip factory, joining Odersun, already headquartered in the city. In 2007, the United States solar giant First Solar opened a factory as well, followed by a second one last year.

Now, though, the future suddenly looks decidedly dark. Odersun declared bankruptcy in March and Conergy, while pledging to return to profit this year, has seen its share price lose 99.6 percent of its value in the last five years. Many doubt the company will survive. Worst of all, however, was the announcement earlier this month that First Solar was closing both of its factories in Frankfurt an der Oder; 1,200 people will soon be jobless as a result.
"We saw the solar industry as a chance to reindustrialize the region and invested significantly in incentives," Frankfurt an der Oder Mayor Martin Wilke told SPIEGEL ONLINE. "This is a serious setback. It is a very difficult situation."
Frankfurt an der Oder's pain is far from an isolated case. The solar industry, once a beacon of hope for an eastern German economy that struggled for years to revive following reunification in 1990, is undergoing a brutal phase of consolidation. There is a massive surplus of global production capacity and the bad news for eastern Germany keeps getting worse. Last December, the Berlin company Solon, which employed hundreds in the Baltic Sea coast town of Greifswald, filed for bankruptcy. Aleo-Solar, based in Prenzlau north of Berlin, lost over €30 million (about $40 million) last year after turning a profit of €31.8 million in 2010, leading many to fear for their jobs there.

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The growing crisis in the solar industry has not chosen to exclusively victimize eastern Germany. Solarhybrid, Solar Millennium and Scheuten Solar, all based in western Germany, likewise found themselves making their way to bankruptcy court recently. The Sarasin report also stated that Freiburg-based firm Solar-Fabrik faces an uncertain future as well. 
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The problems currently facing the solar industry are not isolated to Germany. According to a report issued last November by the Swiss bank Sarasin, overcapacity in solar module production has made a market shakeout inevitable. "The imbalances between production capacities and demand have become too great," the report stated. In 2011, the global production capacity for solar modules soared to 50 gigawatts, but the industry only managed to sell 21 gigawatts of that photovoltaic potential. Furthermore, the growth of solar companies in low-wage countries such as China has contributed to plummeting solar-panel prices. 


Read the entire article here

The much hyped wind turbine industry is facing similar problems, when governments have began cutting subsidies.

The sad truth about the millions of  "green jobs" political leaders and environmentalists both in Germany and many other countries have promised is; they will never materialize.

Danish minister - and the IEA - mislead about fossil fuel subsidies

As the profitability of wind and solar is fast declining, due to cuts in subsidies and tax breaks, the international renewable energy lobby and warmist ministers are desperately trying to counteract by using dubious International Energy Agency statistics:

Last year, David Cameron´s - now deposed retired - energy and climate change secretary Chris Huhne noted in a speech:

 “Globally, subsidies for fossil fuels outstrip subsidies for renewables by a factor of five.”


The latest warmist government minister to use the same argument is "wind energy superpower" Denmark´s Christian Friis Bach:

Speaking at the Center for Global Development event, Danish Development Cooperation Minister Christian Friis Bach noted that fossil fuels received four to five times more subsidies worldwide than renewable energy. 


Many people have not yet realized that IEA is not anymore the kind energy security organization it used to be. The once highly revered Paris based institution is now in the forefront of the global warming "sustainability" crusade. This is also clearly reflected in its approach to statistics.

Ben Pile gives us the reality behind the IEA´s, Huhne´s and Friis Bach´s "facts":

Even more disingenuous is the claim that fossil fuel subsidies outstrip subsidies for the renewable sector by five (or twelve) times. It makes no sense to talk about the proportions of global and absolute subsidies without any idea of how much actual substance were produced by those subsidies. If conventional energy production is more than five or twelve times greater than renewable energy production, then in fact renewable energy enjoys a greater level of subsidy than conventional energy. 
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However, according to the IEA (PDF here), in 2008, the world produced fossil fuels (coal, oil, gas, peat) equivalent to 10,065 million tonnes of oil (Mtoe), but only 90.2Mtoe of energy from renewables (geothermal, solar, electricity and heat, wind). So although renewables only enjoyed a tenth (or so) of the subsides that fossil fuels received, fossil fuels accounted for 112 times as much energy. In other words, on a Mtoe basis, the renewable sector received nearly 13 times as much subsidisation as the fossil fuel sector.
This calculation doesn’t include hyro-electric generation. Some might say this is unfair. But large hydro projects are not included in the UNEP’s definition of ‘renewable’, though small hydro is.

Pile admits that his calculation is crude, but the overall picture is clear: The renewable energy lobby and its warmist government supporters are not being honest about the true costs of wind and solar power.

Greek hopes for economic recovery rest on an illusion

Solar energy will not save Greece

If there still are some people, who have the illusion that Greece could be able to return to real growth under the present regime, these words by PM Lucas Papademos must mean the end of that false hope: 

"The (solar) energy sector gives Greece an opportunity to become a hub for the European Union and third countries.”
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PM Lucas Papademos, who recently spoke at a renewable energy and infrastructure development summit in Athens, said that investment in green energy was a “national priority” to boost economic growth. Project Helios is the Greek government’s massive initiative to ramp up solar power production from 206 MW to 2.2. GW by 2020 and up to 10 GW by 2050. The country is aiming to become the EU’s largest exporter of green energy.
The government hopes that this plan will attract the investment needed and Greece can then transform itself into an exporter of solar power and help other EU countries to meet their renewable targets. Greece’s Energy and Climate Change Minister, George Papakonstantinou, also launched a draft renewable energy plan which will ensure that the country meets EU targets to deliver 80 percent emissions cuts by 2050.

Günther Oettinger, EU Commissioner for Energy, thinks that the Greek solar project will succeed:

“Helios is a unique opportunity to demonstrate that renewable energy technologies like photovoltaics are becoming competitive in the near future through European cooperation. It could be the showcase project on the way to a truly integrated European market for electricity from renewable sources, while simultaneously helping the Greek economy to recover.”


Read the entire article here

Papademos and Oettinger - like most other EU leaders - live in a "renewable green energy" dream world of their own, far from the realities of the energy sector. Solar power is failing just about everywhere - why on the earth should it succeed in Greece, of all places?

The sad truth about solar energy: "The days of cell production in Western countries are numbered"

The lights of the German solar industry are soon going out. The same will happen in all other Western countries:


The German solar industry is at a turning point. The bankruptcy of Q-Cells this week shows that the days of German solar cell production are numbered. Asian competitors took the lead years ago, and German government subsidies were part of the problem. 
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The worst hit in the German solar crisis are companies that made bad business decisions. Most of the companies effected failed to wean themselves from reliance on government subsidies. The companies had all been aware that the market was rapidly changing, but they reacted too late or too slowly. Solar subsidies had been a highly effective political means of promoting the environmentally friendly technology, but in a rapidly maturing market, they are quickly losing their impact.
And the problem isn't the recent cuts to solar subsidies. The problem has been mismanagement across the industry in Germany.


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most of the lights are likely to go out soon in Germany's Solar Valley. Experts like Michael Schmela, editor in chief of the industry publication Photon International, see no future for the companies based in Bitterfeld-Wolfen. "The days of cell production in Western countries are numbered," he said recently.


Read the entire Der Spiegel article here

Now also Italy will cut the subsidies to wind and solar energy projects

An increasing number of governmentsl are cutting subsidies to wind and solar energy. Now also the government of Italy has realized that there is a limit to how much taxpayers´ money can be wasted in order to enrich the owners of uneconomical renewable energy projects:


Italy will move to reduce taxpayer subsidies to its renewable energy sector after last year's boom in solar power, Industry Minister Corrado Passera says.
The official said Saturday in Cernobbio, Italy, that taxpayer subsidies doled out to the wind and solar power industries had generated "excessive" investments in the sector, The Wall Street Journal reported.
"Italy has important goals to meet and even surpass," he said, but added, "we need to do so without over-reliance on taxpayer resources."
The government, Passera said, will in the coming years "realign" the level of its incentives to those of other European countries.
The comments came a day after Paolo Andrea Colombo, chairman of Italian electric utility Enel SpA, said the heavy subsidization of alternative energy was hurting traditional producers such as his company.
"The development of renewables, combined with the stagnation of demand, is making it difficult to cover the production costs of conventional systems, putting at risk the ability to remain in operation," Colombo said.


Read the entire article here

The German solar madness: "Chinese boom has been generously supported by German financial aid"

Having read the Der Spiegel article about the total failure of the Merkel government´s solar energy and climate change policy , one wonders how long the German taxpayers are going to accept the madness:

Germany long aimed to be a front runner in the solar energy industry, but waning subsidies and rising competition from China have clouded its outlook. To add insult to injury, the Chinese boom has been generously supported by German financial aid.

It was a bad week for Germany's crisis-ridden solar industry. First the government announced plans to slash subsidies for electricity from solar energy. Then the share prices of solar-panel makers plunged. Finally, after several rainy days in a row, the outlook for Germany's solar economic miracle, long enthused about by Environment Minister Norbert Röttgen, now seems worse than ever before.

The environment minister with the center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) is aware who is principally to blame for the plight of the German solar industry: the Chinese. The emerging economy's dumping policy has led to ruinous competition in the global market for solar panels, Röttgen said last Thursday, when he accused the Chinese of pursuing a "pricing policy designed to displace German companies." Thanks to generous Chinese government subsidies, he added, the competition is able to "obtain almost unlimited capital."

It is indeed true that Asian low-wage manufacturers have access to funding sources to which German companies do not. Those sources include the German government's budget for development aid, as well as the budgets of government institutions that aim to promote what the environment ministry calls "global climate justice" in its brochures. More than €100 million ($134 million) in government subsidies have already reached China from Germany, partly along circuitous routes, to bolster an industry that has already become the dominant global market player in some areas.