Comment by tomp
2 days ago
> I see some people campaigning against European green energy or the renewables and it doesn't make sense whatsoever unless you are aligned with Russia or USA.
No, you got this exactly the wrong way.
In fact, it was Russia who initially funded European (German) "green" movement, their main purpose was opposing nuclear (by far the greenest elective source of energy, as evidenced by France's carbon footprint), so that Europe (Germany) would get hooked on Russian gas.
The plan worked brilliantly!
Thats actually not that wrong, because there were contracts between Russia and germany for over then years, where Russia offered very cheap gas for the German industry (Nord-Stream I and II was build for that).
But beside this, Germany was leading in the anti-nuclear movement, and finally shut down there last nuclear power plant two years ago. Currently, in Germany, renewable energy sources [1] are around 75% in the summer and and 55% in the winter month. Renewable are growing fast [2].
[1] https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/renewable_share/chart....
[2] https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/remod_installed_power_...
Don't forget that they have power shortages and strict rationing in that equation. So at the end of the day they have 75% solar but it is not adequate for the population.
Thats not true. It's 75% renewable. Means, biomass, wind, solar etc.. And in Winter it is 55% renewable. Shortages are compensate mostly with fast booting Gas, Coal and Hydrogen plants. Also trading[1] in Germany is relatively even (in/out).
[1] https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/import_export/chart.ht...
This is the first time I hear that there is strict (or any) electricity rationing in Germany and I've lived here all my life.
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We do not have shortages or power rationing. As another poster said, you may be confusing Germany with South Africa, though that's not a common confusion usually.
I'm afraid I have to ask here for a citation for your very confident but to my knowledge wrong statement that Russia (I suppose you mean the USSR) financed the green movement in Germany. Russia is equally a builder and supplier for nuclear energy, so makes significant profit on that angle and has no reason to fight nuclear.
Also the initial green movement was not against nuclear power per se but rather a peace movement against nuclear weapons, the concept just expanded over time to cover also civilian nuclear power, notably after Tchernobyl.
In contrast Russia is indeed known to finance both the far left (which has a lot of 'Ostalgia') and far right (whereby nationalism works against Western unity and strength) movements.
Nuclear power is great if you have it. Not even the French seem capable of building new ones at a timescale or cost that is relevant in todays world dominated by renewables together with storage recently kicking into overdrive.
It's great for the companies that run the plants because they are highly funded by subsidies from the society in which they are built. Nuclear power simply does not work from a capitalist point of view. Former Governments just swallowed this pill, because they had no natural resources that produce enough energy and they tried to stay independent. Now you can do this with renewable energy.
Some of that is because people are so skeptical of it, it never got to economies of scale. You could say the same thing about pretty much any energy source prior to it being scaled up.
Tbf, perhaps that is still an instrinsic problem with nuclear, that it isn't easily ammenable to economies of scale the way solar pannels or fossil fuels are.
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> Nuclear power simply does not work from a capitalist point of view.
So what? Capitalism doesn't work from any point of view.
”The west is weak. Not capable of building like the motherland.”
So blowing up their own nuklear power plant in 1986 was a Soviet-Russian plot to make the German Green party popular? I find that a bit hard to believe ;)
(because the German anti-nuclear-energy movement and the rise of the Green party all got kickstarted by the Chernobyl disaster)
Whether or not this was true historically, its not really relavent now, where the primary green thing is solar which competes with russian gas.
My spidery senses after engaging with online anti-nuclear power propagandists in Sweden: they are still at it.