Germany Faces Another Energy Threat... Stranded Coal From Low River Levels

[Economy 52,906]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-62519683

 

Germany's economy and energy security is facing yet another threat as if depleted natural gas levels weren't bad enough and the risk of Russia cutting off the little still flowing at any time wasn't bad enough...

 

Unusually dry weather has caused rivers including the biggest River in Europe for transportation purposes to fall really low reducing carrying capacity of ships. Some of the largest cargo vessles already had to be taken out of commission temporarily until water levels return to safe levels while smaller ships have to carry lighter loads

 

This is not only increasing transportation costs and aggravating supply chain disruptions during a time of high inflation and congesting railways as suppliers seek alternative modes of transportation for their products... But the rivers were also the main form of transporting Coal which is being used to temporarily offset the natural gas shortage

 

If Coal Gets Stranded or gets carried in deminished capacity, some of the backup Coal Plants being used to offset reduced output from Natural Gas Plants will not be able to operate as planed putting further strain into the grid

[Mother of Puppies 36,615]

Our country willl go down the drain with this government anyway

[Nathan 2,079]

10 minutes ago, Mother of Puppies said:

Our country willl go down the drain with this government anyway

I’m not following German politics (I’m in the U.K. and everything is literally on fire), but regardless of government we are in a climate emergency and no one is waking up to that fact. 

[Mother of Puppies 36,615]

3 minutes ago, Nathan said:

I’m not following German politics (I’m in the U.K. and everything is literally on fire), but regardless of government we are in a climate emergency and no one is waking up to that fact. 

The biggest problem in our world are corrupt politicians. (and they don’t give a **** about climate change)

[monstrosity 3,979]

Hmm ever heard of renewable energies????? God germany makes me so angry, coal in the EU in 2022

But anyways I hope the German population won’t suffer too much from that (for what it’s worth we’re all going to suffer tremendously in the coming years so yeah)

[Economy 52,906]

31 minutes ago, Monstruous said:

Hmm ever heard of renewable energies????? God germany makes me so angry, coal in the EU in 2022

But anyways I hope the German population won’t suffer too much from that (for what it’s worth we’re all going to suffer tremendously in the coming years so yeah)

To be far Germany wasn't really a coal nation anymore but then the Russia thing happened

 

Yeah being dependant on Russia was always a political risk they obviously got too comfortable with, but now that u can't change that... There weren't many other immediate alternatives when gas got cut 

[AsleepOnTheCeiling 6,976]

1 hour ago, Monstruous said:

Hmm ever heard of renewable energies????? God germany makes me so angry, coal in the EU in 2022

But anyways I hope the German population won’t suffer too much from that (for what it’s worth we’re all going to suffer tremendously in the coming years so yeah)

Germany is moving towards renewable energy. It was moving away from nuclear and had shut down 9 (I believe) nuclear plants last year. They're already being dismantled. The other 3 are supposed to be shut down this year. This was planned like 20 years ago and as such planner certifications, nuclear fuel purchases, etc around it. Because of the war in Ukraine and Russia's oil thing, they're having a lot of issues with energy and are using coal until they can get more renewable energy in place. 

[Zeitgeist 228]

My rent already went up due to higher gas prices  and the government is doing nothing for the lower income households + students 

[PopEmergency 2,208]

14 minutes ago, Zeitgeist said:

My rent already went up due to higher gas prices  and the government is doing nothing for the lower income households + students 

same here, just got the letter yesterday that  heating and operating costs will increase by 30%, starting in October 

[Economy 52,906]

55 minutes ago, TortureMeOnReplay said:

Germany is moving towards renewable energy. It was moving away from nuclear and had shut down 9 (I believe) nuclear plants last year. They're already being dismantled. The other 3 are supposed to be shut down this year. This was planned like 20 years ago and as such planner certifications, nuclear fuel purchases, etc around it. Because of the war in Ukraine and Russia's oil thing, they're having a lot of issues with energy and are using coal until they can get more renewable energy in place. 

This. I was gonna mention the nuclear decomissioning as well as an issue 

 

Tho I disagree with it

 

[HiddenWeirdo 4,278]

35 minutes ago, Zeitgeist said:

My rent already went up due to higher gas prices  and the government is doing nothing for the lower income households + students 

Honestly, students were already f*cked when Miss Rona caused many layoffs in Germany. The government did almost nothing to help them back then so why should they now? 

[Economy 52,906]

4 hours ago, HiddenWeirdo said:

Honestly, students were already f*cked when Miss Rona caused many layoffs in Germany. The government did almost nothing to help them back then so why should they now? 

How much did Germany do in terms of financial support for ppl during pandemic?

[AsleepOnTheCeiling 6,976]

6 hours ago, Economy said:

This. I was gonna mention the nuclear decomissioning as well as an issue 

 

Tho I disagree with it

 

Why do you disagree with it?

[Economy 52,906]

1 hour ago, TortureMeOnReplay said:

Why do you disagree with it?

Because in my opinion atm global warming is a far bigger environemntal threat than nuclear waste and a much bigher killer than the very low chances of a nuclear accident

 

And since decomissioning nuclear power plants now means fossil fuels running longer, the pros of shutting nuclear down now do not outway the cons in the majority of Nations

 

If u manage to build enough capacity with other green energy or renewables, then shut down nuclear. I think before that, closing them does more harm than good

 

I live in Canadas most populated Province and nuclear has supplied as much as 51% of our power usage (i saw that figure years ago it may have changed slightly)...

 

Anyway very few fossil fuels are burned here for power and that has been the case already for many years already and nuclear is largely what made that possible

[Supersonic 49,376]

2 hours ago, Economy said:

Because in my opinion atm global warming is a far bigger environemntal threat than nuclear waste and a much bigher killer than the very low chances of a nuclear accident

 

And since decomissioning nuclear power plants now means fossil fuels running longer, the pros of shutting nuclear down now do not outway the cons in the majority of Nations

 

If u manage to build enough capacity with other green energy or renewables, then shut down nuclear. I think before that, closing them does more harm than good

 

I live in Canadas most populated Province and nuclear has supplied as much as 51% of our power usage (i saw that figure years ago it may have changed slightly)...

 

Anyway very few fossil fuels are burned here for power and that has been the case already for many years already and nuclear is largely what made that possible

Daily reminder that Germany's current energy crisis in part is also caused by France's over-reliance on nuclear power plants. 

Only 26 of 56 nuclear reactors in France are currently running on low capacity BECAUSE it is too hot, there's not enough skilled professionals to maintain the power plants (labour often times has to be outsourced to other countries) and the powerplants need continuous water supply of rivers to cool down. That doesn't work because France's rivers shrivelled down even worse than the German ones.

Because of that, Germany has had to export a HUGE chunk of the energy it produced via renewables into France. It's raising electricity prices in France AND Germany. Matter of fact, Germany has had to continously export energy into France since 2020, just because they failed to properly maintain their nuclear system.

Climate change is showing that new nuclear reactors (and trying to maintain them without access to cooling water in the summer), is nothing but a pipe dream. Nuclear & fossils are blowing up on our faces at the same time.