When it comes to supporting and accelerating the adoption of renewable energy, Germany’s Erneuerbare Energien Gesetz (EEG – Renewable Energy Act) is widely considered the world’s most effective policy framework. The Act provides for feed-in tariffs to encourage the uptake of alternative energy sources and reach green parity – i.e. the point at which renewable [...]

Minister President Erwin Sellering of Meckenlenburg-Vorpommern, wants his state is to be the first to cover its own electricity demand entirely with renewable energies in the not too distant future. Mr Sellering states that Meckenlenburg-Vorpommern itself wants to become an export state for energy. The Minister President’s optimism is based on a “model for new [...]

The high tech association Bitcom wants the federal Government to increase its promotion of the expansion of intelligent electricity networks. “We need a national roadmap for Smart Grids” said Mr Volker Schmidt from Bitcom at the CeBit Fair in Hannover. Germany’s pilot project, E-Energy started in 2008 where eight German regions test how the grid [...]

Germany’s federal Minister of Economics, Rainer Brüderle wants to abolish support for solar power in the medium term as a part of the renewable energy law (EEG) in Germany. Nevertheless, he does not want a rapid end to the feed-in tariffs of photovoltaic systems. This week, the Environment Committee and the Bundestag are again dealing [...]

According to the German Energy and Water Association, the share of renewable energies in power production increased by 0.5 percent to about 17 percent in 2010. 41 percent of power production was produced by coal power stations, nuclear energy accounted for 23 percent, natural gas for 14 percent, and other sources for 5 percent. With [...]

In the past six years, the number of biogas plants in Germany has almost tripled. There are currently about 5,800 in operation and the six thousand mark will soon be exceeded. The increase of installed electrical power is even more significant: it has multiplied tenfold from about 250 to about 2,300 megawatts. Nearly 18 billion [...]

Germany’s Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources listed 408 potential sites for CCS projects in a registry that has been kept secret do date. The underground storage of CO2 is expected to make an important contribution to saving the climate but these plans for CCS plants have already led to massive public protests. A [...]

According to the German green electricity industry, the uniform subsidy system for renewable energies in Europe demanded by EU Energy Commissioner Günther Oettinger is not going to help reduce costs but push them up instead. In Berlin, the German Renewable Energy Association (BEE) explained that it is untrue that an EU-wide, standardised subsidisation would make [...]

Germany will fail to achieve its energy savings goals set by the European Union, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported today, citing an internal European Commission document. Efforts of EU Member States are so far only sufficient to increase energy efficiency by 10 percent at the most by 2020. While EU members agreed in 2007 to increase [...]

In a contributing article on the German government’s energy policy in the “Handelsblatt”, Germany’s Minister for Economic Affairs, Rainer Brüderle, said energy policy had to be well-founded in terms of regulation, it had to be market-oriented and open to new technology. Mr Brüderle added that the further development of power grids and storage facilities had [...]