We must change. Here is how we can (and you can save money while you’re at it!)
I hope my four earlier blog posts convinced you we must change. “Yes, yes, I know what the issue is,” some of you felt perhaps a little impatiently, reading those blogs. “I know we are leaving a footprint. What I want to know: can we do something about it?”
Well, thanks for asking: we can!
We have roughly three things we can do ourselves. One, we can change how we generate energy. Two, we can reduce our own energy consumption. There are various ways in which to do so, such as how we transport ourselves, the goods we buy, what we eat, etc. And three, we can influence others in doing so too. This post is about the first: generating renewable energy.
Talking numbers
More than €12 billion was invested in clean energy in Germany in 2017. What we consider clean energy are the likes of solar energy, wind power, hydropower and biomass. Especially wind energy is big in Germany. Wind turbines generated 14,3% of all electricity in 2016. 19% in 2017. And it continues to grow.
In the year 2000, projections showed that the global wind capacity would reach 30 GW in 2010. “That doesn’t mean anything to me, Yori. I don’t know what a GW is!” Well, that’s a good point. I didn’t know what 1 GW tangibly means either. But I looked it up for you. Here we go!
1 GW represents a big number. 1 GW is short for 1 gigawatt, which is 1,000 megawatt (or MW). 1 MW is 1,000 kW (kilowatt). And 1 kW is 1000 watts. That’s something you should be familiar with! 1 GW is equal to 1 million machines that use 1000 watts each. If you let one of the machine that uses 1000 watts (or 1 kW) run for one hour, you’ve used 1 kilowatt for one hour. That’s what we call 1 kWh. Guess what, kWh is the familiar unit on your electricity bill! Perhaps it is a little more tangible already. “Now you’ve mentioned my electricity bill. How much does an average household use?”, you may think.
The average household in the USA uses 10,766 kWh of electricity per year. Now, I knew we Dutchies are known to be frugal. I found a supporting fact, as we use 3.5 times less than they do in the USA! The average Dutch household uses about 3,000 kWh per year [1]. The Mr. & Mrs. Kamphuis household proudly uses less than half of that — just 1,345 kWh according to the latest annual statement of our energy provider. Interested in how we reached such little use? In how that’s saving as hundreds of euros per year? If so, let me know, so I can cover that in a later blog. For now, back to the GWs and our tough calculations!
Bear with me for some more calculations. There are 24 hours in a day and 365 days. That gives us 8760 hours per year. If we divide the use per year over the hours in a year, we know how many kW one household uses. In the USA a household uses 1,23 kW. A Dutch household requires 0,34 kW of electricity on average. 1 GW thus powers a bit over 800,000 households in the USA. And it powers more than 2.9 million households in The Netherlands! I think this makes it tangible, doesn’t it?
As I said, 30 GW was envisioned for 2010. In fact, 180 GW was realized worldwide in 2010, which is 6 times as much! In 2017 there was 514 GW, which means that the world has added 45 GW (what was envisioned as one and a half time the world capacity in 2010), for 7 consecutive years!
In my efforts of writing this blog I also discovered a fact that makes me sad. Of the total renewable capacity of the European Union (which for 2017 was 445,496 MW) less than 1.8% is generated by my country, The Netherlands (7,706 MW to be precise), while we house roughly 3.3% of the EU’s population. In other words: our country is slacking behind [2]. And that while we consume a year’s worth or resources faster and faster. With the calculations out of the way, let’s look at what all the renewable capacity brings us instead.
Where does this get us?
In March 2018, Portugal generated 104% of its electricity demand from its renewable sources. Yes, you’ve read that correctly: 104%. More than 100%. Which means they exported renewable electricity, and made money in the meantime. In Denmark, wind power alone met its full demand on April 17th of 2016. Scotland’s electricity needs were met for the entire month of June, all generated by wind. The UK’s wind turbines generated more than twice as much energy as from coal in 2017. Coal, as you remember, is bad for your health. These are all hopeful examples of that we can change! In fact, wind turbines have the potential to generate 40 times the world’s electricity consumption. That’s a huge opportunity for decreasing our dependency on fossil fuels — the big cause of global warming.
Solar energy is another success story. Solar energy, generated by those black or blue things you can put on your own roof, has grown from a worldwide capacity from 15 GW in 2008 to 390 GW in 2017. The growth is much quicker in recent years. China alone newly installed 53 GW of solar capacity in 2017. So why is solar growing so quickly? For one, getting solar power installed on your roof is easy. There are ample providers of solar. Next to this, solar is lucrative. Regardless of whether you’re convinced that we should be moving towards renewable energy, solar can save you a lot of money. Even the Kentucky Coal Museum decided to shift to solar power. A coal museum! It saves them between $8,000 and $10,000 every year, on a bill of about $2,100 per month.
Naturally, I found this very interesting. Every euro unspent is a euro you don’t need to earn, after all! I’ve done some research and asked for a quotation of several companies, which came by our house. The difference between them I thought was enormous. Two of the three companies came up with what I though was a reasonable quotation, with the price per panel including installation roughly the same. One of them charges more than double, and in my conversation with them I discovered their calculations weren’t even close to right.
In The Netherlands, each kWh of electricity costs €0,20, twenty eurocents. The two providers I still take seriously offer panels with a yield warranty of 25 years, for €300-€330 per panel including everything that’s necessary to come to a working installation. Each such panel should generate roughly 275 kWh per year, but let’s say 250 kWh. That’s because our roof has the ideal south-west orientation, without shade. What this means is that for each €300-€330 I’m investing, I’ll get 250 times 20 eurocent out of it, each year. That’s €50 per panel per year. The costs are repaid 6 to 6.6 years. From then on you’ll have free energy for the other 18,4 years that fall under the warranty — and like more. The return on your investment is close to 15%. Much better than what your bank pays you (in The Netherlands not much more than 0,010%). The best thing: this something you can do yourself.
If you get solar cells you are turning your own rooftop into a power station, fueled by the sun, making you a little bit of money every single day. The frugal Mr. & Mrs. Kamphuis households needs a mere 5 panels to generate all the electricity we use. That brings the total investment to €1,500-€1,650, depending on which of the two providers we go for.
Are you convinced this may be something for you? I strongly advise you to get at least three different companies to give you a quote, so you can avoid the cowboys offering you the stuff way too expensive. See if they have a track record. And ask for references, and go to talk the owners to hear whether they’re satisfied.
If you don’t have the cash for such an investment at hand right now, don’t panic. You can always choose to switch to a provider that guarantees you’re using green electricity. This helps reduce the environmental impact. But perhaps, there are more options. If you are Dutch, you can get the VAT of solar panels back (I have taken this into account in the calculations above already). Some municipalities offer subsidies, provinces and the national government sometimes do so as well. And lastly you can talk to your bank, because some banks allow you to take an extra mortgage (or extend your current one). In The Netherlands, some banks even charge lower interest rates if your house is more energy-friendly!
Our first investment with regards to reducing our environmental impact will go to something else however — which may come as a surprise, given the sublime return on investment described above. I will cover this in the next blog. There is much more to discuss!
The last give-away of today, this is a quick reminder why we do it again.
Sources:
[1] To put it into perspective: Kuwait households use about four times as much as the USA, and Nepalese households use less than 400 kWh per household (2014 numbers).
[2] The numbers on sustainable energy generation are from IRENA.
