In 2023, renewable energy sources accounted for more than half of electricity generation in Germany for the first time
Last year, renewable energy sources accounted for more than half of electricity generation in Germany for the first time. The share of wind, solar, biomass and hydropower plants as well as other renewables rose from 48.4 percent in the previous year to 55 percent, as announced by the Federal Network Agency in Bonn on Wednesday. In addition to the expansion of wind power, this was primarily due to a decline in generation from conventional energy sources such as coal and nuclear power.
Generation from renewable energies rose by 7.5 percent to 251.2 terawatt hours. Production from wind turbines was particularly significant, accounting for over 31% of total production. Generation from onshore plants increased by 18% to 118.7 terawatt hours. 23.5 terawatt hours of electricity came from offshore wind farms - 4.9% less than in 2022.
Feed-in from photovoltaic systems remained constant at a good 55 terawatt hours. Solar power thus accounted for a good twelve percent of production. "The less sunny weather after the record year of 2022 was compensated for by the strong increase in capacity in 2023," explained the Federal Network Agency. Electricity from biomass accounted for over eight percent of total generation, while hydropower and other renewables accounted for 3.4 percent.
In terms of conventional energy sources, production from hard coal fell by almost 37 percent and from lignite by almost 25 percent. By contrast, production from natural gas rose by 31.3 percent. Taken together, coal now only has a share of just over 26 percent. The last nuclear power plants were shut down in April, reducing their share of total production from 6.7 percent in 2022 to 1.5 percent.
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In 2023, hydropower also contributed to the record-breaking share of renewable energy sources in electricity generation in Germany, accounting for 3.4% of the total. The growth in renewable energy sources, such as wind, solar, biomass, and hydropower, has led to a significant decrease in the use of conventional energy sources like coal and nuclear power. Moreover, Germany continues to explore various energy sources for power generation, with solar energy accounting for nearly 12% of the total production.
Source: www.ntv.de
