nuclear-news

Renewables to dominate future EU energy supply despite nuclear buzz – German engineers

Clean Energy Wire, 24 Jan 2025, Benjamin Wehrmann, https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/renewables-dominate-future-eu-energy-supply-despite-nuclear-buzz-german-engineers

The Association of German Engineers (VDI) has cautioned that new-found enthusiasm for nuclear power, as a means to mitigate global warming, must not slow the rollout of renewables, which are set to become the dominant power source. Germany and Europe therefore must stick to a path that maximises the potential of renewable power, and keeps the supplementary role of nuclear power in check, said VDI energy expert Harald Bradke. A recent paper from the International Energy Agency (IEA) titled “The Path to a New Era for Nuclear Energy” indicated there had been a recent shift towards nuclear energy, which according to the VDI “could lead to false conclusions if taken superficially.”

The IEA’s own World Energy Outlook 2024 painted a more nuanced picture, particularly for Europe, the VDI argued. The energy agency found that the EU’s nuclear power production dropped from 854 TWh in 2010 to 616 TWh in 2023, leading the technology’s share in electricity production to fall from 29 to 23 percent. One scenario on “announced pledges” that countries made in the context of the Paris Climate Agreement used by the IEA for the EU would mean that nuclear generation grows to 860 TWh by 2050 – while its share continues to slide to about 15 percent by that year. At the same time, renewables could grow from 45 to 84 percent. Solar PV’s share in this scenario grows form 9 percent to 24 percent and wind power’s share from 18 to 46 percent between 2023 and 2050. “These figures support the assumption that renewable energy sources are going to remain the main drivers of the energy transition despite the prognosed surge in nuclear energy production,” said VDI energy expert Badke.

Germany shuttered its last three nuclear reactors in April 2023. The step that ended a process which had been in the making for more than two decades was met with criticism both domestically and internationally due to its timing during the European energy crisis and the lost potential of nuclear energy generation for emissions reduction. However, despite a nuclear renaissance championed by Europe’s nuclear power leader France, most countries in the EU have much larger and more advanced plans to boost their renewable power capacities.

Globally, the IEA’s outlook found that nuclear power production grew by a mere 0.33 percent between 2010 and 2023 to 2,765 terawatt hours (TWh), while the share of nuclear power in global electricity production shrank from 13 to 9 percent during the same period. The IEA’s announced pledges scenario forecast a doubling of the world’s nuclear generation to 6,055 TWh by 2050. However, due to the simultaneous rapid surge in electricity demand that looks set to more than double, the technology’s share would remain at only 9 percent by the middle of the century, VDI pointed out.

At the same time, forecasts show that renewables will grow at a much faster pace worldwide during this time: solar power’s global electricity production share will rise from only 5 percent in 2023 to about 40 percent by 2050, while wind power’s share is expected to rise from 8 to 26 percent. All renewable energy sources together could increase their share from 30 to 83 percent, IEA found.

January 29, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Germany, renewable | Leave a comment

Green energy in abundance

“Sorry, pessimists, the energy problem is solved.” Ulrich Fichtner, SPIEGEL colleague, is almost right with this description of the energy crisis ( Ulrich Fichtner: Born for the big opportunities, Spiegel-Buch-Verlag 2023 ).

Correct: The problem is solvable, but it is far from being solved. The energy question is the survival question of the 21st century. We know what we are doing, but we are not yet really doing what we know and doing it sufficiently. The new solar dynamic is like this: cheaper, better, faster. We can still win the climate war.

At least things are moving in the right direction. Examples:

• We have seen a 90 percent reduction in the cost of a kilowatt hour of solar power within two decades.
• That is why green electricity is booming worldwide, as are storage technologies.
• Solar energy and wind energy are the cheapest sources of electricity in the world. According to the Fraunhofer Institute ISE, PV with battery storage is now cheaper than electricity from conventional power plants.
• The photo (right –on original) shows one of the largest photovoltaic plants in the world in Abu Dhabi. It is expected to be four times as large by 2030 and will then be able to produce as much electricity as around 15 medium-sized nuclear power plants.
• We have global growth rates for renewable energies of 40, 50 and 60 percent per year.
• In Germany, renewables were already the largest source of electricity generation by 2024 – almost two thirds renewable and only one third fossil fuels.
• According to calculations by the World Energy Agency, IEA, this will be the case globally by 2027.
• The World Energy Outlook, published every year by the IEA in Paris, assumes that demand for fossil energy sources will peak in 2025. Although the global economy will continue to grow then, CO2 emissions will shrink.
• The energy transition is in full swing worldwide. I agree with my colleague Ulrich Fichtner when he writes: “A renewable economic miracle is sweeping the globe” (page 87).
• Even in China, solar and wind will have overtaken coal by 2024, something that seemed unthinkable until recently.
• Not only the USA, but also Germany has decided to produce its electricity completely CO2-free by 2035.
• The European Union doubled its share of green electricity between the beginning of 2022 and the end of 2023.
• Costa Rica, Iceland and Kenya already produce their electricity almost entirely from renewable sources, but from very different sources, which is due to their different geographies.
• China aims to produce half of all renewable electricity worldwide by 2027.
• The United Arab Emirates, Morocco, Norway and Chile have ambitious plans to produce solar hydrogen.
• In addition to China, the USA, Egypt and Morocco are investing heavily in photovoltaics.
• The ten ASEAN countries in East Asia want to increase their share of renewable energies by 70 percent by 2027 compared to 2023 – Brazil, Cuba, Argentina, Mali and other countries in Central and Southern Africa have similar goals.

Children born today can experience a climate without crisis in 2050 – when they will be 25. People all over the world will be the winners of the solar world revolution in the future when they produce renewable electricity for one or two euro cents. Fortunately for us, plans for a better world with peaceful coexistence without exploitation of people and nature are on the table worldwide.

In spring 2024, Abu Dhabi’s energy minister told me that his country was already producing one kilowatt hour of solar power for 0.7 euro cents. The figures mentioned show that the world is electrifying and developing economically at a previously unimaginable pace. On this point, too, I can agree with Ullrich Fichtner: “A child born today will not have to worry too much about the world’s energy supply on its 25th birthday.” (Page 86).

This reminds me of a new book title by couples therapist Matthias Jung about the miracle of transformation. He writes: “It is not where the wind blows from that determines our path, but how we set the sails.” ( Matthias Jung: Setting Sails – The Miracle of Transformation, emuverlag ).

January 22, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Germany, renewable | Leave a comment