Monday, February 2, 2015

Explaining This Power Situation in Simple Details

This is an essay that takes a minute to lay out and for non-Germans to grasp completely.  To be honest.....I'd guess that even fifty-percent of German society don't even grasp the whole story.

Since the Japanese tidal-wave event and nuke-plant disaster.....Germany made a decision up to quickly flip the switch on nuke plants in Germany.  Sooner, instead of later.....was the philosophy.

Over the past decade.....big success on the wind-power agenda.  By 2014, folks are now looking at wind-power being able on a reasonable basis....of between fifty and sixty-percent of the German electrical grid.  In another decade....they might be fairly close to ninety-percent.

Turning off the nuke plants within the next decade will happen.  Well....unless some issue is not resolved.

You see....most of the wind-energy achieved in Germany....ISN'T in the south half of Germany.  It's from the far north section, where wind is a daily event.

The nuke plants in Bavaria and the south half of Germany?  Well....that's where they built the grid into.  So they don't have a robust system existing....taking the grid power of the north....into the south.

For months, there's been this talk of a robust powerline running from the north coast.....all the way into the heart of Bavaria.  Naturally, it'd all be new and pass through regions that don't want a robust new powerline deal.

The CSU chief (Horst Seehofer) is pressing hard on this....noting that it's not an optional decision....this or nothing.  There's no choice....a line has to be built and extend into Bavaria.

Private property owners are a bit peeved, and various political parties are for the project or against the project.....without any real reason to explain their logic.....other than a political topic to get free talk time on some TV forum.

Extending the nuke power stations because of no power connection to Bavaria?  Well....that's the option left which no one wants to mention.

So, imagine yourself working a deal to put a big new company into Bavaria, and their key thing is electrical stability and high-rate of consumption.  You look over this topic and realize NO answer has been resolved on extending the grid into Bavaria.  2022 is only seven years away when the nuke plants go off-line.  There's not much time to talk about this and get a plant into operation.

Frankly, if the topic isn't resolved this year.....it's a fairly good chance that the nuke plant and the turn-off date....are in jeopardy.  I'm not a rocket scientist or anything.....but this type of project for the 'turbo-line' extension isn't something that you whip up, plan, start construction and finish in eighteen months.  When you hear some public forum getting all chatty about this....it's a fairly big deal which will only get bigger by the end of 2015.

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