Germany converts significantly more coal into electricity
The good news first: Germany will achieve its targets for the expansion of renewable energies in 2022. On the other hand, however, significantly more electricity was generated from the climate killer coal - a consequence of the loss of natural gas supplies from Russia.
According to the monitoring report by the Federal Network Agency and the Federal Cartel Office, the shortage of natural gas due to the end of gas imports from Russia and the resulting increase in gas prices on the wholesale markets led to a decline in electricity generation from natural gas of a good 14% in 2022. In contrast, electricity generation from lignite-fired power plants increased by a good five percent, while that from hard coal-fired power plants was around 14 percent higher than in the previous year.
Generation from renewable energies increased by around 8% in 2022 due to the strong expansion of wind and photovoltaic systems and strong solar radiation in 2022, according to the report. The share of electricity from renewable energies in gross electricity consumption rose to 45%, up from 40% in 2021.
The statutory expansion paths for onshore wind, photovoltaics and biomass were reached in 2022. According to the authorities, however, this is no reason to slacken efforts. "In order to achieve the increased expansion targets for 2030, however, an even higher expansion is unavoidable," explained the Federal Network Agency and the Federal Cartel Office.
According to the report, Germany's most important sources of gas imports in 2022 were Norway, the Netherlands and Belgium, with a total volume of 983 terawatt hours. This corresponds to around 68 percent of all German gas imports. Müller emphasized that Germany still needs the planned liquefied natural gas terminals in order to further diversify Germany's gas sources.
Return to coal-fired power plants effective
The Federal Network Agency has reminded the German government of its climate targets in view of the increase in coal-fired power generation and called for greater efforts to expand renewable energies so that the target set by the German government of at least 80 percent of gross electricity consumption coming from renewables can be achieved.
"In order to prevent supply bottlenecks, the legislator has responded with a temporary return of coal-fired power plants and a lifetime extension for the remaining nuclear power plants in 2022. These measures have proven to be effective, but we must not lose sight of the climate targets," warned Klaus Müller, President of the Federal Network Agency.
RWE dominates the power generation market
The President of the Federal Cartel Office, Andreas Mundt, also said that it was necessary to take a look at the market dominance of individual companies in conventional power generation.
"Even if the market concentration here has fallen again in 2022 after an increase in the previous year, it remains the case that RWE and some other generators are increasingly indispensable for meeting the demand for electricity," said Mundt. "We must continue to monitor the market closely here, especially as the importance of electricity imports for limiting the market power of domestic electricity producers has increased, and in some cases become indispensable."
Overall, net electricity generation in Germany decreased slightly in 2022 due to the fall in electricity consumption, according to the monitoring report.
Despite achieving targets for renewable energy expansion in 2022, an unfortunate surge in coal-fired power plant electricity generation was observed. This increase was due to the decline in natural gas supply and escalating prices from traditional gas suppliers like Russia. Furthermore, the energy sector is keeping a close eye on renewable energy sources like wind, solar, and biomass to meet ambitious targets for 2030, as the expansion paths for these sources were already achieved in 2022.
Source: www.ntv.de
