Record German Wind Power

Record German Wind Power Lifts Renewable Share Over ’20 Goal

By Rachel Morison - Dec 5, 2013 12:05 PM ET 
            

Record output from wind farms lifted Germany’s share of renewable electricity production above its 2020 target of 35 percent today as a storm from Scandinavia battered the nation’s northern coast.

 

A low pressure system dubbed Xaver, with hurricane-force winds of more than 140 kilometers (87 miles) an hour, hit the northern coastline of Germany today, according to the country’s weather service. Electricity produced by sun and wind supplied 27.2 gigawatts, or 36 percent, of Germany’s power at 1 p.m. Berlin time, according to the European Energy Exchange AG.

Germany is already Europe’s biggest producer of electricity from wind and sun and its newly formed coalition government agreed last month to get as much as 45 percent of electricity from renewables by 2025. The share of power from wind and solar rose to 49 percent on Nov. 9, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The average share of renewables in Germany across the whole of last year was 22 percent.

“Germany might already be meeting its 2020 target for some hours, but it would need a lot more installed capacity to average 35 percent over a year,” Gary Keane, principal consultant at Poeyry Oyj, an adviser to governments and utilities, said by phone from Oxford, England.

Wind output in Germany hit a record of 25.2 gigawatts at 1:45 p.m. and will account for 39 percent of supply at 11 p.m., according to EEX data.

Forced Shutdown

The strength of the storm forced turbines to shut down in some parts of Germany. The 48-megawatt Baltic 1 offshore wind farm operated by Karlsruhe-based EnBW Energie Baden-Wuerttemberg AG (EBK) automatically halted operations at 1 p.m. when winds became too strong, Friederike Eckstein, a spokeswoman, said by phone.

“Wind turbines can start to cut out when wind goes above 60 miles an hour, so with a storm there is an increased risk of that happening,” said Keane.

German power for tomorrow declined 10.3 percent to 30.79 euros ($42.05) a megawatt hour on the Epex Spot exchange in Paris at 5:22 p.m. That’s 38.63 euros lower than the same contract in neighboring France which settled at 69.42 euros a megawatt hour, the data show.

Wind and solar power are given priority access to the grid in Germany, meaning peaks in production can force coal and gas-fed plants to reduce their output. The proportion of power produced from conventional plants is expected to fall to 61 percent at 11 p.m., compared with 79 percent at 7 a.m. today, according to EEX data.

“The storm will also bring heavy gusts of wind to the Netherlands, Denmark and Poland until tomorrow afternoon,” Andreas Gassner, meteorologist at MMInternational, said by e-mail from Appenzell, Switzerland. “Denmark and Poland could see as much as 15 gigawatts of wind until early on Monday.”

Audubon report says wind turbines, wildlife can coexist in Maine

Seth Koenig, Bangor Daily News

Thursday, December 5, 2013 at 11:50 am

FALMOUTH — One of Maine’s top wildlife advocacy groups says there’s plenty of room in the state to accommodate animal habitat and wind energy development.

Photo: Gabor Degre / BDN

One of the 38 windmills on Stetson Mountain in Township 8 Range 3.

In a report released Wednesday night, Maine Audubon found that of the 1.1 million acres in the state where there’s enough wind to justify turbines, 933,000 acres don’t overlap with sensitive natural areas and could be developed with little impact to Maine’s wildlife.

About 45 percent, or 418,000 acres, of the space with both adequate wind and low wildlife impact is found in the state’s expedited permitting areas designated for wind projects, stated the report written by wildlife biologist Susan Gallo.

The study comes as wind energy continues to receive steady attention in Maine, with the Board of Environmental Protection on Thursday scheduled to hear an appeal of an approved wind farm slated for Hancock County and some lawmakers still upset over the recent decision by Norwegian energy giant Statoil to drop its offshore wind plans here.

Late last month, the organization Environment Maine issued its own report on wind energy, finding that Maine generated a New England-best 884,000 megawatt-hours of wind power in 2012, an amount that displaced nearly 535,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel plants.

Maine Audubon's 34-page report on wind energy’s potential conflict with the state’s wildlife found that, for the most part, it doesn’t.

The organization stressed that each proposed development site be reviewed individually for possible impacts on bird and animal species, but that in a general sense, there is a lot of room in Maine for wind farms to be erected without intruding on sensitive habitats.

As a result, the report stressed, there should be no reason why wind development takes place where it significantly affects wildlife.

“We recommend that any land-based wind development in the mountainous areas of northern and western Maine and along our coast be carefully studied,” the report stated, in part. “These regions stand out as areas with a lot of wind and wildlife resource overlap.”

Given current technology, Maine Audubon reports that the state would need to see wind development on approximately 15 percent of the windy acreage that does not overlap with wildlife resources in order to meet state goals of reaching the 3,000-megawatt capacity of land-based wind energy by 2030.

That production would provide power for between 675,000 and 900,000 homes, and would entail the construction of 600 more wind turbines, the report concluded.

Opponents of the wind energy buildout in Maine, including the group Friends of Maine Mountains, have argued that the turbines blemish the state’s pristine mountain ranges and are not as effective as other renewable energy sources, such as hydropower.
Maine Audubon acknowledged the concerns of wind power opponents and stated its findings did not eliminate the need for site-by-site reviews that take those concerns into account.

“The location and siting of wind developments is a complex issue, and while there is a broad array of important concerns – impacts to the local economy, tourism, outdoor recreation, regional power supplies, local residents, and scenic views – Maine Audubon has always focused its concern on wildlife and habitat,” the report stated.

Berlin energy demonstration

Berlin energy demonstration attended by 16,000

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  As estimated 16,000 protestors attended the event. Image: http://www.erneuerbare-jetzt.de
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  Daniel Kluge of BEE said he felt the event sent a “good signal to the new government”. Image: http://www.erneuerbare-jetzt.de

An estimated 16,000 protestors attended a demonstration in Berlin on Saturday, aimed at ‘saving’ Germany's Energiewende renewable energy policy from possible attack by the incoming coalition government.

Demonstrators marched under the united slogan “Save Energy Revolution: The sun and wind instead of fracking, coal and nuclear” as they attempted to get across a message of increasing renewable energy capacity and energy efficiency to lawmakers. The event included a symbolic protest on the lawn of the Reichstag.

While some commentators were pleased that the coalition deal struck between Angela Merkel’s union of Christian conservative parties and the centre-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) included ‘bandwidth’ targets for renewable energy generation, others felt the coalition deal would slow down the introduction of renewable energy capacity.

German Renewable Energy Association (BEE) spokesman Daniel Kluge attended the event. Kluge told PV Tech that the turnout was remarkable considering the weather was fairly poor and that the estimated turnout of 16,000 far exceeded the 5,000 to 10,000 protestors BEE had hoped to see.

Kluge described the event as colourful and while attendees marched under the banners of different organisations, all were unified by the one goal of persuading the German government to “enforce the exit of coal and nuclear”. Kluge said he felt the event sent a “good signal to the new government” and with “hard months” of uncertainty expected to lie ahead, the unity of different organisations coming together was very important.

Organisations involved in the demonstration included anti-nuclear group Ausgestrahlt, Friends of the Earth Germany (BUND), Greenpeace, representatives from companies including wind turbine manufacturer Enercom and associations for wind, solar and biogas industries. Democratic action website Campact, which bundles petitions and is used as a tool to mobilise campaigns, also hosted a petition.

Kluge said that despite the difficult political situation expected to face supporters of the Energiewende in coming months, the mood on the day was very positive. He also said that the timing of the demonstration to take place three days after the coalition deal was announced was also a coincidence that was “timed perfectly”. The agreed coalition deal has yet to be approved by the members of the SPD, who will decide its fate in a ballot on 15 December.