Use case: Germany

It's going great!!!11

https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/DE/live/fifteen_min...

Germany shows how trying to rely solely on renewables is a fool's errand.

They can go from having over 50% of their electricity generated from renewables, but then suddenly it falls to barely over 20% in a single day. But the low production can last multiple days (for reference, look at the 3rd, 4th, and 5th of December 2025).

For reference, to store a single day of Germany's electricity at the current battery storage price ($66/kwh) you would need over a hundred billion dollars. Even if battery storage is to be divided by 3 in the coming years, we are still talking tens of billions of dollars for something that isn't even reliable and has a hard limit (go over the 3 days of storage capacity, too bad, you're fucked).

Even considering how nuclear construction is stupidly expensive nowadays, that would still be cheaper and more reliable (in large part thanks to German bureaucracy, fuck you by the way for the sabotage at Flamanville).

Renewable is the German superiority complex applied at scale. They can't help themselves from overengineering cars, so that makes sense.

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nuxi 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

We need more Kohl, that'll do the trick...

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notTooFarGone 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Ok let's link Germany when the sun is not shining and the wind is not blowing.

Thanks for cherry picking and not linking averages.

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nosianu 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

That's what this is for, in general: https://energy.ec.europa.eu/topics/infrastructure/trans-euro...

Also, Germany currently has the problem of much more and more reliable wind generation in the north, but not enough network capacity to send it all south when needed. It is being addressed, but as expected, it is very complicated because infrastructure across the whole country touches the interests of a lot of groups with very different interests.

We might need much better tunnel building equipment and a deep sub-terranean network... (useful sci-fi idea, needs to be able to cope with mild earth quakes in some regions).

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Phil_Latio 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Then look at the the average and compare with France. Germany causes 6 times more Co2 stemming from energy production.

The energy mix in Germany leads to a situation where electric cars are dirtier than diesel (for the first ~200000 km / 125000 miles driven).

	▲	derriz 3 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		> The energy mix in Germany leads to a situation where electric cars are dirtier than diesel (for the first ~200000 km / 125000 miles driven). Renewable share of electricity production is about 56% so this claim is not at all credible. https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/germany-covers-nearly-5...
	▲	Archelaos 3 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Citation needed. I don't belief a word of this.

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lawn 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

You still need electricity when the sun isn't shining and the wind isn't blowing you know?

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Archelaos 3 days ago | parent [-]

Gas-fired power plants are planned for load balancing, and these are already being built in such a way that they can be converted to hydrogen operation at a later date.

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lawn 3 days ago | parent [-]

Gas... How "great" for the environment.

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ViewTrick1002 3 days ago | parent [-]

Perfect is the enemy of good enough. We still need to decarbonize construction, agriculture, aviation, maritime shipping etc.

Let’s not stare us blind at perfect in one sector wasting money and opportunity cost which needs to be spent on harder to abate industries.

	▲	lawn 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		Seems weird to say that while arguing against nuclear.

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nixass 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

You can move slider for last 24hrs, there were sunny bits in Germany. CO2 is constantly shit over here. And yeah.. what am I supposed to do when it's not sunny or no wind? Fart into windfarm?

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Archelaos 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

This! Don't be disappointed by the downvotes. The fussile+nuclear energy lobby is desparte because of Germany's success. This industry is the equivalent of the tabacoo and pestizide industry of the past. Everything is fine, cheap and under control -- until it isn't ...