A German Physicist Said Getting Rid of Nuke and Coal Is Simple. Here are 5 Reasons Why I Agree.
Debunking Myths of the Energy Transition for the 1001st Time
Naysayers of the energy transition like to think that the transition towards renewables is merely a green dream of some tree huggers. So when the German physicist Harald Lesch told them that it is feasible and even “very easy” to replace nuclear and coal with renewables in Germany, they should be more convinced, right?
Wrong. Energy transition naysayers still left angry comments under the video as their objection: if Germany get rid of both nuke and coal, then …
- “It will rely more on France nuclear!”
But nuclear power plants in France are facing serious problem and France regularly relies on foreign imports in recent winters (2016, 2017). How will the crippled French nuclear fleet help Germany much?
In addition, many mistake the results of economic dispatch (an optimized solution) for a necessary measure to remain grid stability (the feasible set). A renewable based power system exchanges wholesale electricity with neighbors not because it has to; it is simply mutually beneficial to do so.
Most grid studies concluded that Germany can handle all the VRE on its own even without import/export. Fraunhofer’s Kombikraftwerk project even proved this to be true for a 100% RE system. - “Its electricity prices will blow up!”
The marginal installation cost of VRE is dropping tremendously. Öko-institute estimated that the sum of wholesale prices and renewable surcharge fee per kWh will peak by 2023.
Source: EEG-Rechner. Berechnungsund Szenarienmodell zur Ermittlung der EEG-Umlage, Öko-Institut (2017) - “It will need a huge grid expansion and that is costly!”
Most 100% RE modeling would conclude that grid costs would be around 10–15% of the total system cost in a power system. Capacity cost will still be the main factor when discussion economic viability of the transition. The system will favor more renewables as the prices of wind, solar, and battery continue to fall.
Source: Response to ‘Burden of proof: A comprehensive review of the feasibility of 100% renewable-electricity systems’ - “What about inertia, control reserve, voltage stability, … (any type of power system stability issues) !!”
State-of-art renewables are technically capable of providing these auxiliary services, and under the right market and regulation conditions they can even outperform conventional sources. See How to Harvest the Full Flexibility Potentials of Renewables? for more. - “… It’s just impossible! Too much to be done!”
Yeah, people used to think it would be impossible to integrate more than 5% of renewables into the grid. Now?
I have always expected to see something more creative from the naysayers. I have always been disappointed.
Note: the latter part of the video dealt with how 100% RE based energy system can be achieved with a super grid that connects Europe and north Africa. This might not be the only solution, and it might not be the most feasible one.
There exist other studies that take approaches to lower the primary energy demand to a scale that Europe can become self sufficient. For example, switching to a wind and solar dominant system will reduce the primary energy demand substantially, and so will switching from combustion engines to EVs.
