CommieGIR posted:

No that's not how we got Fukushima at all. How we got Fukushima was TEPCO ignoring sound advice on the placement of their Generators and Backup Circuit Switchgear.

Worth noting that 15 miles away, Fukushima Diani has the same reactors and same plant setup, but their switchgear was further above the water level and suffered minor ill effects despite going through the same tsunami.
And yet, despite the meltdowns, despite the incident, no major impact to human life was caused. The sheer amount of hand wringing from the accident is hilarious given the number of people killed by the tsunami itself versus the plant meltdown.

Phanatic posted:

First you claimed " If you have an all nuclear fleet capacity factors of around 0.3 could be expected, which triples the price of nuclear energy.." Then Electric Wrigglies said "I think 30% utilisation of nuclear is an exaggeration even in a pure nuclear fleet." Then *you* said "30% isn’t an exaggeration, its the capacity factor of ERCOT’s generation fleet as a whole."

So at this point I admit, you've run rhetorical rings around me: you seem to be arguing that ERCOT's mix where nuclear provides less than 9% of the electricity and runs at 97% capacity day in and day out is somehow...evidence...that if we did a thing which literally nobody says we should do and power civilization exclusively via nuclear power that nuclear capacity would drop to less than a third of what nuclear shows in Texas.

Do I have that right?

CommieGIR posted:

In other news, Germany is shooting themselves in the foot.
https://twitter.com/mark_lynas/status/1545345583262695424?s=20&t=dciToJ83HBMsaIDOqprnxw

CommieGIR posted:

Yes, but its normally mixed with water.

They basically wash the core in high strength boric acid to permanently poison it and render it dead. Its basically out of legislative spite.

CommieGIR posted:

The problem is exactly that. That they are unaffected by this vote. That they refuse to extend their lifetime, they'd rather double down on those coal plants than address the issue.

CommieGIR posted:

The summary reflects that they plan to continue to close the plants on schedule, which will require more plants coming online to make up the difference. That is reflected in the summary.

quote:

There is no case where Germany will be able to close the plants on schedule AND not add more plants, especially in Winter. This is part of why the Dutch are asking them to put off the shutdown of the last 3 plants. In the end, this will both result in Germany massively missing their emissions goals and falling back on more fossil fuels for energy generation.

Do you think the demand those reactors are satisfying right now will just disappear when they are shutdown, which is scheduled for the end of this year? Even more, do you think its okay, in the middle of a growingly more apparent climate crisis, to handwave away the sheer madness of accepting emissions increases by burning lignite coal to replace them?

quote:

This is standard process for removing nuclides in contaminated metal, once its done the reactor is toast. Its commonly done relatively quickly after Power Off once the fuel is removed, and once its done there's no going back.
https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/application/pdf/2020-12/decontec.pdf

Jaxyon posted:

Are they reactivating coal plants, and deactivating nuclear plants at the end of the year?

If the tweet summary is inaccurate about causation, but accurate about the effects, then this is largely an academic clarification.

Which is useful sure, but....

Jaxyon posted:

As I said, you are technically correct about the tweet being misleading. The best kind of correct!

But the larger picture is accurate. Germany is bringing fossil fuels on line directly due to shutting down nuclear plants.

CommieGIR posted:

There's nothing inaccurate there? The plants are scheduled to go offline at the end of this year. What exactly are you actually arguing is wrong? The SDP-Green's could instead extend the closure of the nuclear plants till 2024 or beyond and avoid a lot of this.

quote:

They are not. And given Germany has been extremely vocal about their commitment to shutting down their nuclear plants, they don't need to say explicitly as to why they are spinning up standby coal plants. Its obvious as to why.

quote:

Find something better to nitpick about the tweet other than Germany's commitment to double down on fossil fuels rather than deal with their fear about nuclear plants which emit 1/100th the emissions. What are you defending or attacking here? Germany is in the wrong with their current strategy.

CommieGIR posted:

Which they haven't done and are not going to be able to do. Germany's renewables only plan is not only in utter shambles, they are re-opening and bailing out their coal industry. They hosed up. Its over for at least the next decade or more. The vast majority of the EU is actively doubling down on Renewables + Nuclear and trying to get away from coal at all costs, Germany doesn't seem to be capable of both reading the room and admitting they are now in a bind from a half-assed plan based on fearmongering and lobbying by the fossil fuel industry.

You are defending someone cutting off their nose to spite their face here. Germany could save those plants and these coal plants would be totally unnecessary. Your country is addicted to fossil fuels in the worst way and instead of admitting they made a bit mistake they keep making the mistake and say that they have the best plan. Sorry, you are absolutely out of your mind.

quote:

https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20211231-germany-to-close-nuclear-reactors-despite-energy-crisis

Which they wouldn't even have to do if they hadn't doubled down on shuttering the nuclear plants at the end of the year. One of these things affects the other despite the fact that the word nuclear doesn't appear in the article.

You can look at both and realizing removing nuclear baseload means adding baseload elsewhere. These things are distinctly connected.

Jaxyon posted:

Yeah it's not a super weird totally amazing coincidence that the country known for it's large fossil fuel production industry is turning to fossil fuels in a time where we are undergoing a crisis created by fossil fuels.

CommieGIR posted:

Your country has shuttered more nuclear plants than it will ever replace with renewables.

quote:

Sorry man, they are putting those coal plants on standby because they intend to close the last three in some stupid dedication to sheer madness.

quote:

I don't care what they passed, what they've done is have a worse carbon footprint than France next door, and they double down on closing the very things that make France one of the lowest emitters in the EU.

quote:

Their goal to decarbonize their energy is now going to be a decade behind because they openly made themselves dependent on Russian gas to enable them to shutter nuclear plants, and here we are and they are reaping it, and there answer is to double down on lignite coal. COAL!

quote:

At least admit shuttering their last 3 nuclear plants is bad, that's 15% of their total Electricity load. You have to at least admit that.

Oracle posted:

Which portion of that 50% of renewables is wood pellets?

CommieGIR posted:

On a good day. Remind me again, Germany's not in an energy crisis, is it? It is? Oh.

CommieGIR posted:

And France will continue to do it better, sorry. Germany's renewables only plan is a joke, and its hilarious to see them double down on something that isn't actually working.

https://www.energate-messenger.com/news/223699/nuclear-power-plant-problems-make-france-an-electricity-importer posted:

Nuclear power plant problems make France an electricity importer

Paris (energate) - In terms of nuclear power, 2022 will remain a difficult year for the French state-owned company EDF. According to the company, in the first five months its in-house nuclear power production of 134 billion kWh was 15 per cent below that of the same period last year. According to an analysis by the BEE, this gap led to France importing massive amounts of electricity from Germany in the first half of the current year for the first time in a long time. For this purpose, the association analysed data from the Federal Network Agency on electricity import and export patterns between Germany and France.

While Germany always imported between 2 and just under 8 billion kWh from France in the first half of 2015 to 2021, the opposite was true in 2022: France purchased just under 2 billion kWh from Germany in the first six months of the current year. Current data from the transmission grid operator RTE from 5 June also fit into this picture. According to this, the group's nuclear power plants currently cover 55 per cent of the national electricity demand in France. At peak times and with good availability, however, this quota is up to 70 per cent. The BEE also blames this development on the early summer, which has been very hot in parts: "The above-average temperatures have caused the waters in France to warm up. As a result, numerous nuclear power plants in France had to reduce their output because they could no longer cool their reactors down far enough," the association concludes.

EDF: Summer could bring cooling water shortages

Fittingly, EDF recently admitted to media representatives that the expected heat and drought would probably lead to a reduction in nuclear power production due to a lack of cooling water. This is according to the Bloomberg information service. France experienced its first heat wave almost a fortnight ago in June. Regardless of the weather, the French state-owned company continues to struggle with technical problems that force large parts of the 56 French nuclear power plants to undergo overhauls for longer than originally planned. This in turn prompted the company to revise its production forecasts for nuclear power.

Jaxyon posted:

Is it not the biggest producer in the world of the type of coal that is pretty much only used in power generation?

Potato Salad posted:

It's also pretty hilarious to watch people cite "Germany is over half renewables!" with (1) the obvious gaping hole that is the rest of the (growing) fossil share

quote:

and (2) the slice of German "renewables" that involves importing entire forests from Africa and Southeast Asia at horrifying rates to burn as sacrifice to the German Green Party's false gods of "sustainability" and "stewardship."

quote:

Top trading partners (import of "Wood and articles of wood; wood charcoal") of Germany in 2020:
Poland with a share of 16.6% (1.44 billion US$)
Austria with a share of 14.8% (1.28 billion US$)
Czech Republic with a share of 9.16% (793 million US$)
China with a share of 7.44% (644 million US$)
Russia with a share of 5.14% (445 million US$)
Netherlands with a share of 3.66% (317 million US$)
Finland with a share of 3.3% (286 million US$)
Denmark with a share of 2.99% (259 million US$)
Sweden with a share of 2.99% (259 million US$)
France with a share of 2.93% (254 million US$)

MrYenko posted:

I mean, they’re not German forests getting ground up and compressed into pellets, so it must be green, right?

mobby_6kl posted:

But... there seems to be an issue. Nuclear output is like half of what it was in the winter and they're importing a ton instead. Although the total is also way lower, which makes sense if you're not using A/C and don't need as much heating and lighting.

Anyone knows what's up with this? Importing so much right now is not a good look.

quote:

French Nuclear Power Crisis Frustrates Europe’s Push to Quit Russian Energy

Plumes of steam towered above two reactors recently at the Chinon nuclear power plant in the heart of France’s verdant Loire Valley. But the skies above a third reactor there were unusually clear — its operations frozen after the worrisome discovery of cracks in the cooling system.

The partial shutdown isn’t unique: Around half of France’s atomic fleet, the largest in Europe, has been taken offline as a storm of unexpected problems swirls around the nation’s state-backed nuclear power operator, Électricité de France, or EDF.
...
But the industry has tumbled into an unprecedented power crisis as EDF confronts troubles ranging from the mysterious emergence of stress corrosion inside nuclear plants to a hotter climate that is making it harder to cool the aging reactors.
...
But fixing the crisis at EDF won’t be easy.

With 56 reactors, France’s atomic fleet is the biggest after the United States’. A quarter of Europe’s electricity comes from nuclear power in about a dozen countries, with France producing more than half the total.

But the French nuclear industry, mostly built in the 1980s, has been plagued for decades by a lack of fresh investment. Experts say it has lost valuable engineering expertise as people retired or moved on, with repercussions for EDF’s ability to maintain the existing power stations — or build ones to replace them.
...
EDF’s recent troubles began mounting just before Russia invaded Ukraine. The company warned last winter that it could no longer produce a steady nuclear power supply, as it struggled to catch up with a two-year backlog in required maintenance for dozens of aging reactors that was put off during coronavirus lockdowns.

Inspections unearthed alarming safety issues — especially corrosion and faulty welding seals on crucial systems used to cool a reactor’s radioactive core. That was the situation at the Chinon atomic plant, one of France’s oldest, which produces 6 percent of EDF’s nuclear power.

EDF is now scouring all its nuclear facilities for such problems. A dozen reactors will stay disconnected for corrosion inspections or repairs that could take months or years. Another 16 remain offline for reviews and upgrades.

Others are having to cut power production because of climate change concerns: Rivers in the south of France, including the Rhône and the Gironde, are warming earlier each year, often reaching temperatures in the spring and summer too warm to cool reactors.

Today, French nuclear production is at its lowest level since 1993, generating less than half the 61.4 gigawatts that the fleet is capable of producing. (EDF also generates electricity with renewable technologies, gas and coal.) Even if some reactors resume in the summer, French nuclear output will be 25 percent lower than usual this winter — with alarming consequences.

“If you have power plants that are operating well below capacity, we will either have to go to blackouts or revert to carbon-emitting energy, which is coal or natural gas,” said Thierry Bros, an energy expert and professor at the Paris Institute of Political Studies.
...

mediaphage posted:

I think energy storage is really going to grow by leaps and bounds over the next fifty. crazy number of approaches. not all of them are going to be any kind of chemical battery.

Potato Salad posted:

Completely ignoring? No, absolutely not. Battery baseload is an extraordinarily responsive technology and it's going to be an important component of solutions long term.

Potato Salad posted:

Reread the thread, I guess.

It has been restated over and over and over that this is exactly the solution being offered--a diverse portfolio couched heavily on nuclear base load and incorporating storage technologies like pumped hydro and grid scale battery installation and heavy investment in renewables.

"REPowerEU Plan posted:

...
REPowerEU is about rapidly reducing our dependence on Russian fossil fuels by fast forwarding the clean transition and joining forces to achieve a more resilient energy system and a true Energy Union.

We can significantly reduce our dependency on Russian fossil fuels already this year, and accelerate the energy transition. Building on the Fit for 55 package of proposals and completing the actions on energy security of supply and storage, this REPowerEU plan puts forward an additional set of actions to 3 :
·save energy;
·diversify supplies;
·quickly substitute fossil fuels by accelerating Europe’s clean energy transition;
·smartly combine investments and reforms.
...
They also require coordination between action on the demand side, to reduce energy consumption and transform industrial processes to replace gas, oil and coal with renewable electricity and fossil-free hydrogen, with action on the supply side to create the capacity and framework to roll out and produce renewable.
...
The REPowerEU plan cannot work without a fast implementation of all Fit for 55 proposals and higher targets for renewables and energy efficiency. In the new reality, the EU’s gas consumption will reduce at a faster pace, limiting the role of gas as a transitional fuel. However, shifting away from Russian fossil fuels will also require targeted investments for security of supply in gas infrastructure and very limited changes to oil infrastructure alongside large-scale investments in the electricity grid and an EU-wide hydrogen backbone.
...
Accelerating hydrogen

Renewable hydrogen will be key to replace natural gas, coal and oil in hard-to-decarbonise industries and transport. REPowerEU sets a target of 10 million tonnes of domestic renewable hydrogen production and 10 million tonnes of renewable hydrogen imports by 2030. The Commission:
...
Accelerated efforts are needed to deploy hydrogen infrastructure for producing, importing and transporting 20 million tonnes of hydrogen by 2030. Cross-border hydrogen infrastructure is still in its infancy, but the basis for planning and development has already been set by the inclusion of hydrogen infrastructure in the revised trans-European networks for energy. Total investment needs for key hydrogen infrastructure categories are estimated to be in the range of EUR 28 – 38 billion for EU-internal pipelines and 6 - 11 billion for storage.

To facilitate the import of up to 10 million tonnes of renewable hydrogen, the Commission will support the development of three major hydrogen import corridors via the Mediterranean, the North Sea area and, as soon as conditions allow, with Ukraine. Green Hydrogen Partnerships will facilitate the imports of green hydrogen while supporting the decarbonisation in the partner countries. Other forms of fossil-free hydrogen, notably nuclear-based, also play a role in substituting natural gas (see map).
...
To support hydrogen uptake and electrification in industrial sectors, the Commission:

·will roll out carbon contracts for difference and dedicated REPowerEU windows under the Innovation Fund to support a full switch of the existing hydrogen production in industrial processes from natural gas to renewables and the transition to hydrogen-based production processes in new industrial sectors, such as steel production 17 ;
...

Kaal posted:

Are you some sort of hydrogen fan? Certainly that's being pushed more than any alternative. Explain what you mean rather than being arch and cryptic.

CommieGIR posted:

The inverse being true: There is little evidence that battery deployments will ever meet or outpace our energy demand, so that also seems like a dead end. Might as well give up now, because we wouldn't want to invest in long term projects regardless of the real, proven benefit.

Phanatic posted:

It's not a thing. Hydrogen comes from steam reformation of natural gas.

quote:

But in no case is it a method of generating power.

quote:

If you had abundant nuclear power, you could get it from cracking seawater. If you have abundant renewables, you could use hydrogen to load-shift, cracking seawater into hydrogen when the wind blows and burning the hydrogen when the wind doesn't.

Kaal posted:

Green hydrogen isn't the plan, the plan is to rebrand Russian fossil gas as "clean energy". Europe is not even close to being able to supply its current electricity needs with renewables, much less electrify its transportation, heating, and industry, then start creating green hydrogen at 30% efficiency. On the other hand, there's a rainbow of "transitional hydrogen types" available from gas, oil, and coal that the fossil fuel companies are itching to sell (and collect carbon subsidies on like biomass). It's greenwashing, pure and simple. There is an absolute ton of this thread dedicated to the rise and fall of hydrogen over the last 10 years.

quote:

EU Hydrogen Strategy (July 2020)

Introduction – Why we need a strategic road map for hydrogen

Hydrogen is enjoying a renewed and rapidly growing attention in Europe and around the world. Hydrogen can be used as a feedstock, a fuel or an energy carrier and storage, and has many possible applications across industry, transport, power and buildings sectors. Most importantly, it does not emit CO2 and almost no air pollution when used. It thus offers a solution to decarbonise industrial processes and economic sectors where reducing carbon emissions is both urgent and hard to achieve. All this makes hydrogen essential to support the EU’s commitment to reach carbon neutrality by 2050 and for the global effort to implement the Paris Agreement while working towards zero pollution.

Yet, today, hydrogen represents a modest fraction of the global and EU energy mix, and is still largely produced from fossil fuels, notably from natural gas or from coal, resulting in the release of 70 to 100 million tonnes CO2 annually in the EU. For hydrogen to contribute to climate neutrality, it needs to achieve a far larger scale and its production must become fully decarbonised.
...
In order to implement the ambition of the European Green Deal 14 and building on the Commission’s New Industrial Strategy for Europe 15 and its recovery plan 16 , this Communication sets out a vision of how the EU can turn clean hydrogen into a viable solution to decarbonise different sectors over time, installing at least 6 GW of renewable hydrogen electrolysers in the EU by 2024 and 40 GW of renewable hydrogen electrolysers by 2030. This Communication identifies the challenges to overcome, lays out the levers that the EU can mobilise and presents a roadmap of actions for the coming years.
...
The priority for the EU is to develop renewable hydrogen, produced using mainly wind and solar energy. Renewable hydrogen is the most compatible option with the EU’s climate neutrality and zero pollution goal in the long term and the most coherent with an integrated energy system. The choice for renewable hydrogen builds on European industrial strength in electrolyser production, will create new jobs and economic growth within the EU and support a cost-effective integrated energy system. On the way to 2050, renewable hydrogen should progressively be deployed at large scale alongside the roll-out of new renewable power generation, as technology matures and the costs of its production technologies decrease. This process must be initiated now.
...
In the first phase, from 2020 up to 2024, the strategic objective is to install at least 6 GW of renewable hydrogen electrolysers in the EU and the production of up to 1 million tonnes of renewable hydrogen 28 , to decarbonise existing hydrogen production, e.g. in the chemical sector and facilitating take up of hydrogen consumption in new end-use applications such as other industrial processes and possibly in heavy-duty transport.
...
In a second phase, from 2025 to 2030, hydrogen needs to become an intrinsic part of an integrated energy system with a strategic objective to install at least 40 GW of renewable hydrogen electrolysers by 2030 and the production of up to 10 million tonnes of renewable hydrogen in the EU 29 .
...
In a third phase, from 2030 onwards and towards 2050, renewable hydrogen technologies should reach maturity and be deployed at large scale to reach all hard-to-decarbonise sectors where other alternatives might not be feasible or have higher costs.

In this phase, renewable electricity production needs to massively increase as about a quarter 32 of renewable electricity might be used for renewable hydrogen production by 2050.

Kaal posted:

In 1985, 35.9% of global electricity came from low-carbon sources. By 2021, that had skyrocketed up to 38.26%. If we're judging the future by how well we're doing, then we'll reach our 2040 net zero goal by approximately 2964.

https://ourworldindata.org/electricity-mix#:~:text=In%202019%2C%20almost%20two%2Dthirds,and%20nuclear%20energy%20for%2010.4%25.

CommieGIR posted:

That is wholly insufficient, again, we generate and consume hundred of terrawatts hours of just electricity a year.

You are talking about adding a couple hundred gigawatts of storages. That's not enough in any sense of the term.

Kaal posted:

Ultimately, I think there's little doubt that the same group of fossil fuel lobbyists that created Germany's failed Energiewende policies also promoted the "clean hydrogen" dream. The intent is clearly to hook Europe on Russian gas the same way that Germany is, with the rather empty promise that it will some day become low-carbon. But just as Germany's Putin-whispering was irresponsible foreign policy, converting all of Europe to fossil gas is irresponsible climate policy.

CommieGIR posted:

Then comes the part where they only pretend to do part 2 and you get Blue Hydrogen....

...which is what we already do.

Wibla posted:

I should have been clearer in my previous post, I am referring to mixing in hydrogen from electrolysis in this instance, there would be no point in making hydrogen from natural gas and then mixing that back into the natural gas lines going out to consumers

E: Seems this method has issues, so we'll see what actually happens with it.

There's also this research project that seems very promising to generate hydrogen from natural gas with direct CO2 capture, I think I've mentioned it before.

His Divine Shadow posted:

If it grows locally and harvested in quantities that are sustainable sure. Something tells me that since it's the germans, they'l probably import it from abroad in quantities that are anything but and probably fell some old growth forests while they're at it.

Phanatic posted:

That’s just false.

First, people aren’t burning pellets in their homes, they’re burning logs.

Seconds,

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/europe-burns-controversial-renewable-energy-trees-from-us

quote:

Last two working plants were due to be mothballed, but will be used as emergency reserve into 2023 after Russia cuts off gas

Germany is to temporarily halt the phasing-out of two nuclear power plants in an effort to shore up energy security after Russia cut supplies of gas to Europe’s largest economy.

The economy minister, Robert Habeck, announced on Monday that the power plants, Neckarwestheim in Baden Württemberg and Isar 2 in Bavaria, are to be kept running longer than planned in order to be used as an emergency reserve until the middle of next year.

Habeck said that after a stress test carried out with four grid operators, considered worst-case scenarios, they had come to the conclusion that “hourly crisis-like situations in the electricity supply system during winter 22/23, while very unlikely, cannot be fully ruled out”.

He insisted that Germany had “very high supply security” and that the two nuclear plants should remain “on standby until mid-April 2023, in order, if necessary, to provide an additional contribution to the electricity grid in southern Germany”.

The nuclear power plants would be available for operation, and fully staffed, but only on standby and would not produce electricity unless it was deemed necessary.

He insisted that Germany would continue to stick by its plans – regulated by law – to withdraw from nuclear power.

The plants were due to be mothballed by the end of December, the last of Germany’s nuclear power plants to cease working, after a dramatic 2011 decision by Angela Merkel, the then chancellor, in reaction to the Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan.

The extraordinary upending of energy markets since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February has however led to a dramatic rethink.

Power bills across the continent have been soaring in light of dwindling supplies, putting households and businesses under extreme pressure as winter approaches.

The sense of urgency increased when Russia failed to turn on the fifth and last functioning turbine on the Nord Stream 1 pipeline which had carried gas from Russia via the Baltic Sea to Germany. Moscow cited faults on the line, which it said were linked to the sanctions imposed on it.

Discussions on extending the lifetime of the plants have triggered a heated debate in Germany, where nuclear power has been a source of controversy for decades. An announcement by Habeck, a leading figure in the anti-nuclear Green party, on restarting the plants would once have been unthinkable, but the party has come under increasing pressure, especially from its coalition partner, the pro-business FDP, to pause the phase-out.

Many in the FDP hope that today’s announcement may lead to a complete rethink on the phase-out policy, arguing that nuclear power would help Germany achieve its zero-carbon emission goals sooner, as well as helping to secure long-term energy security. The Green party has rejected this position.

“In the winter, our towns and cities will in part be darker because of the fact we have to save electricity. In this situation we should not forgo safer and climate-friendly ways of producing electricity such as nuclear power. This requires more than just extending their operation,” said finance minister Christian Lindner, who is head of the FDP.

Already Germany had been forced to restart mothballed coal-fired power plants, considered the most environmentally damaging source of fuel, which Habeck has stressed was a temporary and painful but necessary measure. So far polls show that the majority of Germans are understanding of the need to at least temporarily revert to nuclear power, given the urgency of the situation, even if they don’t like it.

Habeck has also been trying to fill Germany’s gas storage facilities, using supplies from Belgium, Norway and the Netherlands. Despite Russia’s total switch-off, storage levels stood at just under 86% on Monday.

Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesperson, said on Monday that the failure to resume supplies from Nord Stream 1 after the impromptu maintenance work was owing to “problems with pumping gas [that] arose due to sanctions that were imposed against our country”.

Extending the lifetime of the plants is, though, not expected to boost Germany’s energy supplies by much. Habeck has said they make up just 2% of Germany’s electricity output.

He had repeatedly ruled out resurrecting the plants, while chancellor Olaf Scholz had said it “could make sense”.

Scholz unveiled a new series of inflation relief measures on Sunday, amounting to 65bn euros and encompassing everything from a rise in child support to assistance in housing benefit to cover high energy bills.

Groups and political parties of the far left and far right have pledged an autumn of protests against higher living costs, the first of which is due to kick off in the eastern city of Leipzig on Monday evening.

mobby_6kl posted:

Hmm, the 15TWh figure sounds familiar...



(France and Germany have ~similar consumption)

https://fsr.eui.eu/the-role-of-gas-storage/ posted:

The EU-27 gas storage capacity amounts to 1147 TWh across 18 Member States

quote:

Germany will keep two of its remaining three nuclear plants on standby until at least April 2023, as the country also secures other alternative energy supplies to make it through winter.

Germany will keep two of its remaining three nuclear power plants running until at least April, Germany Economy Minister Robert Habeck said on Tuesday.

Habeck said the two nuclear reactors located in the southern states of the country, Isar 2 in Bavaria, and Neckarwestheim in Baden-Württemberg, would continue running until mid-April.

Officials in Germany earlier this month said they would stick to their plans of shutting nuclear plants by end of this year, but would keep the option of reactivating them in case of asevere energy crunch.

Germany shut down three nuclear reactors in 2021, and shutting the remaining three would officially mark the end of the nuclear phase-out for domestic energy production that had first begun under former Chancellor Angela Merkel's rule.

What did Habeck say?

"The operators will now make all the preparations needed for the southern German nuclear power plants to produce electricity in winter and beyond the end of the year, naturally in compliance with safety regulations," Habeck said.

Habeck said they would still need to make a decision about extending the lifespan of the power plants beyond April, and that decision would be dependent on the nuclear power plant situation in France.

"Today, I have to say that the data from France suggests that we will then call up and use the reserve," Habeck said.

France relies heavily on nuclear power to meet its electricity needs, but its nuclear fleet, the largest in Europe, has come under scrutiny lately.

A great deal of repair work at nuclear power stations have taken many of its nuclear reactors offline, and sent France's nuclear output to a record a 30-year low, exacerabting Europe's energy crisis.

His Divine Shadow posted:

Edit:
BTW, anyone here know how german natgas breaks up into home heating / electricity production?

VictualSquid posted:

If you interpret silence_kit's recent posts as 100% renewables then I feel justified in interpreting a lot of posts here as 100% nuclear.

The german situation is more complex. I would say that in most cases groups arguing for 100% renewable mostly were composed of people who consider fossil gas to be "renewable". And the spending decisions imply that too if you look at them instead of non-binding statements of intend.
.
With that position becoming unpopular this year, there is a pretty massive realignment going on. And the reaction to the green party compromising on the nuclear power extensions implied to me that the pro-nuclear internal fraction is larger then anybody expected (also larger then it was before DL collapsed).
And I personally think that is the most productive space for pro-nuclear activism here. That is making sure that the pro-gas inner party gets replaced by a pro-nuclear fraction instead of the degrowth fraction.

Electric Wrigglies posted:

"Renewables alone" is also in the same boat (another 20 years and the problems will be solved) since the 90's. In the meantime, the tech has been incremental. Things have gotten a bit cheaper here and there and windmills are a lot larger and better placed but nothing that drastically changes multi-day or seasonal storage issues or intermittency. In Australia, bigger gains have likely been achieved by getting mum and dads to install overpriced generation on rooftops out of their own pockets (sometimes subsidized by government/others) than all the advances in renewables tech advances combined.

cat botherer posted:

Random thought: Have there been any proposals to use a stirling engine or something to partially recover energy used in liquefying hydrogen, as like some kind of combined-cycle deal?

Bedshaped posted:

Liquid or gas hydrogen is definitely not an effective storage option due to the inherent low energy density and challenges in storage.

Hydrogen is much better suited as a feedstock to produce something like methanol that is liquid at room temperature, utilizes captured carbon and is both safer and better understood for storage.

His Divine Shadow posted:

Installed capacity or actual generation?

His Divine Shadow posted:

Germans angry and dissapointed at getting what they voted for, google translated.

Oh dear, oh well, so sad.

Bedshaped posted:

Does anyone think CCS and flue gas capture is a reasonable approach for the concrete or steelmaking (or some other process that can't be electrified) industries?

mobby_6kl posted:

Probably not news news if anyone's been following, but Germany is going to order 25GW worth of new gas plants: https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/germany-use-tenders-build-25-gigawatts-new-gas-power-plants-2030-econ-min

Basically this would replace the capacity that is currently generated with coal. Which is a good thing, I guess, though I'm a bit concerned where that gas is going to come from now.

Somaen posted:

Are there any good articles or discussion on the previous pages re:hydrogen? I think this thread doesn't talk about it while it's in the news constantly, presented as the future with a lot of backing from European states. One particular claim that's odd is the EU wanting to use the current gas pipes for hydrogen in the future which seems unreasonable, isn't hydrogen an order of magnitude or two leakier than natural gas?

mobby_6kl posted: