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friendlymessage ,

No matter the platform worldnews comments contain mainly ignorant, overconfident bullshit. Glad to know that there are some things in life one can depend upon.

barrbaric ,

shocked-pikachu

lntl , (edited )

This is the German plan:

  1. Shutdown the nuclear plants
  2. Burn more lignite
  3. WFH

The council said assumptions made by the transport ministry on the effectiveness of the planned and already implemented measures, such as a discounted national rail ticket, a CO2 surcharge on truck tolls and increased working from home, were also optimistic. “Private vehicle individual transport is not addressed, so to speak. And that is ultimately a gap in the transport programme,” Brigitte Knopf, deputy chairwoman of the council, told a news conference presenting the report findings on Tuesday

The plan for transportation emissions, 2/3 of the target to be cut, is WFH. Yikes!

Grimpen ,

If only there was some means of replacing all that coal with a non-carbon intensive source of energy that isn’t dependant on the weather…

Has anyone heard of such a technology?

Sarcasm aside, that Germany shut down their last two nuclear reactors so recently and carried through is astounding. The excuses are mind-boggling. They’re old? Refurbishing is cheaper and faster than new built. They need re-certification? Then do it.

Killing_Spark ,

It’s more efficient to use the money required for

  1. The inspection
  2. The renovations
  3. Acquiring new fuel

And spend it on renewables than to do the above.

Also a big factor noone seems to care about: staff. The people who worked there have other jobs now. You can’t just plop a reactor plant somewhere and expect it to make electricity you need highly specialised staff for that. We also did not invest into training new staff because why would we, with the stop for nuclear power being decided 10 years ago.

dot20 ,

The renewables generate electricity mostly when there is sun/wind, so there is an oversupply at those times and a need to burn natural gas at other times.

The nuclear plants would generate electricity 24/7 with little waste.

Either way, now they are investing the money in digging up lignite, so it’s worse than either renewables or nuclear.

Killing_Spark ,

Either way, now they are investing the money in digging up lignite, so it’s worse than either renewables or nuclear.

Where do you get that from?

The renewables generate electricity mostly when there is sun/wind, so there is an oversupply at those times and a need to burn natural gas at other times.

The nuclear plants would generate electricity 24/7 with little waste.

Yes congrats, we will need to build energy storages. Thats nothing new. Also calling the waste of nuclear plant little might be factually true if you only go by volume. If you go by “amount of pain in the ass to deal with” calling it little would be a very big understatement.

dot20 ,

Where do you get that from?

Duitsland zet vol in op kolen, maar vooral transport blijkt knelpunt - nos.nl/l/2438762

Germany to reactivate coal power plants as Russia curbs gas flow - theguardian.com/…/germany-reactivate-coal-power-p…

The eviction of Lützerath: the village being destroyed for a coalmine – a photo essay - theguardian.com/…/eviction-lutzerath-village-dest…

Yes congrats, we will need to build energy storages. Thats nothing new.

Ok, so where are the energy storages currently being built? This is not exactly a problem that’s cheap or trivial to solve.

Killing_Spark ,

Can’t comment on the first one.

The guardian article says that Germany reactivated coal plants to act as an emergency if the gas would not be enough. It’s important to known that gas is not primarly used to make electricity, gas plants are only used when there are peaks in consumption that can not be fulfilled by any other means. Reactivating plants as an emergency backup is not the same as investing in coal power. I am not clear on whether they were even necessary, afaik the gas reserves never went into a critically low level.

Lüzerath is a whole other story. That deal had been made long ago, RWE agreed to stop mining coal earlier if they were allowed to mine the area with that village on top of it. It became a symbol, and people claimed the coal was necessary to maintain stability in the electricity network. Which was proven wrong it was mostly sold to other countries to be burned in their plants.

For all our faults Germany is steadily leaving both fossile and nuclear power behind.

Ok, so where are the energy storages currently being built? This is not exactly a problem that’s cheap or trivial to solve.

You mean just like nuclear plants are very expensive and non-trivial to build?

PowerCrazy ,

Well you don’t deal with the waste from burning coal at all, so why not do the same for nuclear?

Corkyskog ,

Highly Specialized staff

I watched this animated documentary from the states called The Simpsons that seems to state otherwise.

Tankiedesantski ,

lignite

More like lig-nite deez nuts.

lntl ,

ligma

Sodis ,

@Grimpen You are misinformed there. The energy sector reaches its goal and offshore wind farms and solar panels are actually over-performing, meaning more are built than was planned for this year. The sectors largely missing their goals are the transport and the building sector.

GenEcon ,

Funny, because the energy sector was the only on track to fulfill the targets. Last year it even overshot its targets and is expected to again save more CO2 as planned in 2023.

Maybe, just maybe, its more relevant that other sectors are managed by the FDP (market liberals) and SPD (social democrats), while energy is managed by die Grünen (greens).

lntl ,

Do you know about the transportation sector? It is where 2/3 of Germanys planned reduction is.

nexusband ,
@nexusband@lemmy.world avatar

How about you guys stop this bullshit about the nuclear plants stuff? They were scheduled to be shut down for a VERY long time, the biggest mistake was selling out nearly all the renewable energy manufacturing to China. Nuclear power is only making a profit, if it’s subsidized like crazy.

Not only that - A LOT of Germans are actively against putting up more wind power, let alone photovoltaics. Which is what over 50% voted “against” as well. Those that didn’t go voting, have lost all say in it, so yeah. That’s not a political issue, we Germans are the issue.

JohnDClay ,

So why not modernize or replace the nuclear plants? Battery storage isn’t anywhere close to being able to store baseline energy for a full renewable grid.

I agree it’s a perception issue, but that doesn’t mean nothing can be done about it.

Muetzenman ,
@Muetzenman@feddit.de avatar

Most plants are to old to modernize and building new ones is expensive, takes decates and dosn’t solve the dependency on uran and the nuclear waste problem. Renewables were always the longtearm goal and gas for shortages. Nuclear cant be easy switched on or off, so they aren’t a good solution to help with energy lows.

nexusband ,
@nexusband@lemmy.world avatar

Exactly, just look at Olkiluoto in Finnland. 11 Billion Euros. For comparison, right now, 1 MW in an offshore wind park is about 4 Million Euros. Meaning, for 1600 MW, that’s 6400 Million, or 6,4 Billion. That’s nearly HALF of Olkiluoto’s cost.

nexusband ,
@nexusband@lemmy.world avatar

Because the money for modernizing, let alone replacing those plants is a lot better invested in renewables. Battery Storage is very close to store baseline energy, not in Lithium Batteries though and the projected cost for Redox-Flow Batteries is going to be falling like crazy. It already is on the same level as Lithium, and while it is less energy dense, it’s safer, easier to operate and especially longer to operate. The Dalian VFB in Liaoning, Dalian, China is one of the first “bigger” stations to come online, but there are already a lot of plans. I also have one in my house.

Corkyskog ,

I am curious how many Wh the one in your home is and what you use it for?

nexusband ,
@nexusband@lemmy.world avatar

7,5 kWh, max. continous power is “only” 3 kW, but that’s more than enough to get the house over the night and even for quite some time in to the next day if the weather is bad. Non flammable, no higher insurance rating, and so on.

Brocon ,

You forgot to add that we were once leader in solar tech, but that industry got destroyed willingly by the then ruling CDU and Peter Altmeyer.

nexusband ,
@nexusband@lemmy.world avatar

No - it was destroyed because some idiot higher up in those companies decied, it’s cheaper to sell to China. Same goes for Kuka and countless other spineless fu**s in those companies. Yes, politics plays A role, but they do not make the decisions.

lntl ,

Who cares about renewables v nuclear? Either one will get us there.

If I understand correctly Germany does not have a plan to address transportation emissions.

nexusband ,
@nexusband@lemmy.world avatar

If I understand correctly Germany does not have a plan to address transportation emissions.

Who has in the EU? Switching to BEVs will do shit overall.

cedeho ,

If all the subsidiaries that went into nuclear power the last few decades went to renewables instead Germany would have no issues at all, but hey… giving tax payer money to some very few giant energy companies is more important than creating a Europe leading renewables energy sector that does not rely on russian fossils or nuclear material.

You should know that nuclear power is very expensive while renewables are absurd crazy cheap. I’ve been to a German Endlager and it takes years and BILLIONS of Euros just to seal this thing off. Guess who is paying? Mostly tax payers.

There’s be no company in Germany which would be willing to run a nuclear power plant if they were responsible for the permanent disposal of their waste on their own instead of letting the tax payer pay (most of) for it.

lntl ,

That’s all well and good in the energy sector. What about transportation? If I understand correctly, transportation makes up the majority of the emissions Germany aims to cut

Zacryon ,

Sadly, we have a long history of incompetent transport ministers. That didn’t change with the last elections.

UlyssesT ,

“Recommendations” are useless when line must always go up. stonks-up

Duke_Nukem_1990 ,

Shit I had hoped we could leave the nuclear stans over at reddit.

airportline ,
@airportline@lemmy.ml avatar

What’s wrong with nuclear?

Arcturus ,
@Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

Poor track record with safety (not talking about the big issues such as meltdowns, but smaller issues such as minor leaks, and workplace incidents). Nobody's interested in building them unless they've got profit guarantees and subsidies from the government. Nobody's interested in insuring them in full (unless it's the government). Nobody's interested in the eventual decommissioning process, which can take a century, and again, still costs. Renewables will be up and running, and profitable, long before nuclear is constructed.

PowerCrazy ,

If you see the environment as just another way to profit, and you assume that we can’t save the environment because it costs too much, you are just another shitty fossil fuel executive, but worse because at least the fossil fuel executives get paid for their short-term ideas, you are just supporting them and thereby standing by as hundreds of millions of people are condemned to death, hopefully including yourself, for literally nothing.

Arcturus , (edited )
@Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

So, you're going to spend, billions, to build a nuclear powerplant, that will decarbonise at a slower rate, never turn a profit, be an economic sinkhole megaproject, or, you could just build a solar panel or wind turbine in like, a year, where it'll be functional and working. Profits allow you to reinvest into more projects. Losses, mean you're putting endless amounts of money into less.

PowerCrazy ,

Again if you are worried about “turning a profit” you don’t give a fuck about the environment and need to leave.

Arcturus ,
@Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

If you're constantly pouring money into a loss-making industry, it means you're not efficiently managing your resources to build more projects. Profits from renewables can be reinvested before a single plant can't be constructed. And that nuclear plant, will never make enough profit to build another.

PowerCrazy ,

What the fuck is the point of “making a profit?” The world is burning because of profits. If all fossil fuel plants were taxed at 1,000,000 Million per ton of carbon emissions would you support nuclear then?

Arcturus , (edited )
@Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

The point of making a profit, is so that you can re-invest and allow private industries into the market.

If I made you a loaf of bread, which took 15 mins, and you could sell it for $2 profit. You would be able to sell more pieces of bread correct?

If another person made you a loaf of bread, which took three days to complete, and you make a loss of $10 with each one sold, how many more pieces of bread are you willing to sell?

One feeds your population, the other has to be bailed out by the government, and everyone loses money and investment and time.

This is why China prioritises renewables, renewables are considered superior to nuclear when decarbonising the grid, and the best case scenario for nuclear, according to scientists in academia (as opposed to pro-nuke Youtube videos), requires nuclear to be a minor player in a majority renewables grid (and also be 25% cheaper). Unfortunately making nuclear cheaper, is not ideal.

The pro-nuke argument is literally funded by the mining lobby and the fossil fuels industry. Which is why most of their resources are from lobby groups, YouTube videos, public books, and TED talks... Because they know it's going to be ineffective, and they only need to convince the public. Much like how the whole hydrogen-powered cars narrative is going, or environmentally friendly fuels. It's an expensive distraction.

See the RAB that the UK has for the HPC nuke plant build. Companies are allowed to make a profit even before the powerplant is completed. The government will handle insurance, and decommissioning. Which, happens over a century, at taxpayers expense, and it produces no energy. There's also the storage of radioactive material. All of this, uses money and resources that could otherwise be used for constructing renewables (and the fossil fuels industry loves this plan, because every moneypit nuke plant that is constructed, less renewables are built, and fossils gets to remain in the game because they then become only just one of the underperformers, rather than all), decarbonising the grid (faster, see study), and on top of that, everybody makes money.

But don't worry, renewables are also cheaper and more profitable than fossils in most applications as well, so they'll lose out on future energy projects, besides, like in Germany's case, being used as a backup.

Arcturus ,
@Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

Let me pose you another question. Why do you think, the British Conservatives have invested in making HPC happen (finally agreeing to the demand to allow investing companies to turn a profit even before any energy is produced)? Why have conservatives in South Korea planned to restart a new nuclear industry despite accusations of corruption? Why is it the conservatives in Australia love the idea of nuclear? Is it because they can do the good old-fashioned trope of using the state to make their private company chums some money? Or is it because it's for the goodness of their hearts, and concern for their citizens, while they dismantle the NHS and privatise it, for example?

PowerCrazy ,

Ban private industries from the energy market, recognize that the massive externalities from fossil fuels are a net negative for the entire planet. Fine and Jail the former owners for complacency and wanton disregard for human life. Immediately build nuclear plants that are designed to create stable energy for the populace and get over the idea that profit is the purpose of a power grid.

Arcturus , (edited )
@Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

So, you're going to build a powerplant, that people don't want to fund, that governments are reluctant to build? You'll need to create a government agency responsible for the design and planning, another responsible for training new powerplant workers, another one for the decommissioning process, and another for insurance, and another as a safety watchdog, which might come online in a decade if you're lucky, or closer to two decades if you're not, only for it to not be as effective as renewables, be a constant drain on taxpayers, not be entirely reliable, and be more expensive as an energy source than renewables. Sure, good luck with that plan. I wish you well garnering political and academic support with that. In the meantime, universities, companies, and governments will generally avoid it like the plague. Unless or course, there's a nuclear industry that already exists and needs to be subsidised, or a military nuclear requirement to keep the talent and designs ongoing.

You're deliberately going to build nuclear, ignore studies telling you that renewables decarbonise faster. Because you want to decarbonise. Only for your personal opinions, backed by the fossils and mining industry? You're going to give the fossil industry a lot of money over the first 10 years of absolutely nothing happening.

I will add, the election promises the conservative Swedes have made seem to have disappeared. How convenient.

barsoap ,

Speaking about the safety record here’s what final storage looks like in Germany. That’s another eight billion Euros of cleanup costs right there. I’m not usually that crass but whoever ok’d fucking dumping fucking nuclear waste in a fucking salt mine (unsurprisingly, yes, there’s water incursions) deserves to be shot.

In a nutshell the sentiment in Germany is that the only people that can be trusted to not play it fast and loose with nuclear safety are the Greens, and the Greens rather don’t want to deal with it either so we have a decision.

anteaters ,

Surely the next time they want to get rid of waste they’ll do better! Pinkie promise!

argv_minus_one ,

What’s your proposed solution for the energy storage problem?

ryathal ,

It scares people into making them plan and pay for everything up front. If you did the same with literally any other fuel source it wouldn’t even get built. Coal would be DoA if they had the same limits on radioactive emissions as a nuclear plant.

Arcturus ,
@Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

But that's the thing with nuclear. The upfront costs are massive, and literally irrecoverable. Can you name a single nuclear powerplant that has broken even? I can't. Not unless, it's one that the government has built and then handed over to private industry, for example. Reducing safety from nuclear powerplants is not viable long term. And that's the only way to get them commercially viable.

ryathal ,

It’s not about reducing safety, it’s about reducing regulations that are about the appearance of safety, it’s about not imposing decommissioning costs as part of construction.

The US Navy has been able to consistently and safely build and run reactors for 50 years. It’s basically just fear preventing that knowledge and experience from being used in the commercial sector.

Arcturus ,
@Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

The US Navy isn't concerned about making their fleets commercially viable. Taxpayers expect to subsidise defence, and for the US, this is done at vast cost. They don't expect to constantly be funding an expensive, loss-making powerplant. Not when alternatives are cheaper and more effective.

doom_and_gloom , (edited )
@doom_and_gloom@lemmy.ml avatar

deleted_by_author

    •
    PowerCrazy ,

    Well if you don’t support nuclear because its “too complex,” you de facto support coal, which will inevitably turn into “degrowth” as most of the world can’t support agriculture anymore, and so you will get to nod your head as 100’s of millions are “de-growthed” into starvation.

    doom_and_gloom , (edited )
    @doom_and_gloom@lemmy.ml avatar

    deleted_by_author

    •
    MJBrune ,

    Living up to your name.

    argv_minus_one ,

    Then why are you here? Your horrid omnicidal wish will be, by your own admission, inevitably granted. You have nothing to worry about.

    doom_and_gloom , (edited )
    @doom_and_gloom@lemmy.ml avatar

    deleted_by_author

    •
    argv_minus_one ,

    If you want degrowth, you want to see billions dead, because that is what degrowth means.

    doom_and_gloom , (edited )
    @doom_and_gloom@lemmy.ml avatar

    deleted_by_author

    •
    argv_minus_one ,

    Degrowth means job loss. Job loss means no income. No income means no food. No food means starvation.

    doom_and_gloom , (edited )
    @doom_and_gloom@lemmy.ml avatar

    deleted_by_author

    •
    argv_minus_one ,

    And how, exactly, do you expect to institute this proposal over the objections of the rich? Every previous attempt to do something like this, like the communist revolutions in Russia and China, ended up killing millions of people and accomplishing nothing of virtue, because the rich retained power and forcibly twisted the new post-revolution economy into something even worse than capitalism.

    doom_and_gloom , (edited )
    @doom_and_gloom@lemmy.ml avatar

    deleted_by_author

    •
    argv_minus_one ,

    So, you propose that I live in a state of perpetual nausea from eating nothing but horrid-tasting, questionably-nutritious, plant-based “food” instead of actual food, and then die in the apocalypse anyway? No thanks. Civilization is done for, living in it is miserable enough already, and I am not interested in sacrificing what few shreds of happiness remain in order to accomplish basically nothing.

    The only way to avert the coming disaster is decisive, mandatory action from the top of society on down, and that obviously isn’t going to happen, so the best I can realistically hope for is to live it up and be dead before it gets really ugly.

    But I still do what I asked of others: I reduce my footprint

    Not as much as you could. You still live in shelter, use electricity, exhale carbon, eat carbon-absorbing plants, and excrete methane. Humanity’s very existence is driving global warming. There is no escape.

    support workers’ rights

    running for office

    working towards things like ending harmful subsidies

    None of these things are going to happen. The rich will string you up by the toenails before they let you derail their gravy train, and your fellow proles will cheer as they do it. That’s why we’re doomed: powerful people are enforcing our doom, and everyone else worships them.

    shanghaibebop ,

    Degrowth is a dangerous ideology. For those living in rich countries, degrowth might just mean austerity, for those living in middle and lower income countries, degrowth is going to mean destitution and certain death for x percentage of the population.

    zaphod ,

    Why would anyone who’s against nuclear automatically be pro coal? It’s not like the only options available to us are nuclear and coal.

    PowerCrazy ,

    That is the truth. Nuclear competes with fossil fuels, not wind or solar.

    Ooops ,
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    Nothing in general. Well the build times are rediculous in Europe and planning right not to build nuclear soon is too late already for any agreed upon climate goal. But that's another matter...

    The problem is the brain-washed nuclear cult on social media briganding everything. In the last year on Reddit you couldn't even post any report about any new opening of wind or solar power without it degenerating into always the same story: "bUt ReNeWaBlEs DoN't WoRk! StOrAgE DoEs'Nt ExIsT! tHeY aRe A sCaM tO bUrN mOrE FoSsIl FuElS! gErMaNy KiLlEd ThEir NuClEaR To BuRn MoRe CoAl BeCaUsE ThEy ArE InSanE!!"

    Mentioning the fact that Germany in reality shut down reactors not even contributing 5% of their electricity production that were scheduled for shutdown for 30 years and in a state you would expect with that plan and already more than replaced by renewables got you donwvoted into oblivion every single time.

    PowerCrazy ,

    Reality is uncomfortable for the idealist. But ultimate any sustainable future MUST include nuclear and everything you sarcastically dismissed with that childish spongebob typing is just the reality of our world society. You may as well get upset about how we didn’t leave the “reality stans,” back on reddit.

    In fact, I should turn this back on you, I’m upset about the coal-stans that apparently migrated over here from reddit. If there is any world where you want to claim to be “green,” coal CANNOT be any part of the conversation. If it is, you have failed and don’t’ get to discuss environmentalism anymore.

    AAA ,

    Except nobody is advocating coal. So what do you want to turn back on him exactly?

    Just because you developed a hate boner for anyone who’s not on your nuclear train doesn’t mean they’re pro coal. If you need to put words in others people’s mouths to confirm yourself… you’re wrong.

    With your reaction you just confirmed what he described.

    PowerCrazy ,

    If you aren’t pro-nuclear you are pro-coal, thats the reality. No one is replacing nuclear reactors with anything but coal. The development of wind and solar generation is going to happen regardless, but for every nuclear plant that Germany shut down, they opened, or re-opened a coal plant.

    AAA ,

    Saying “that’s the reality” doesn’t make it a reality. You can repeat it as often as you want, it makes you look like a self absorbed jerk - because it’s simply not true. Just because it’s a nice narrative to push for you not every opponent to nuclear energy is a proponent to coal. Quite the contrary I’d figure.

    The single last coal plant started operation in 2020, and none has been “re-opened”. Some are kept in prolonged reserve mode until 2024 (half a year longer than originally planned), IF the Alarmstufe Gas stays in effect.

    Maybe try with some verifiable facts and stop lying.

    PowerCrazy ,

    theguardian.com/…/germany-reactivate-coal-power-p…I guess “reactivating coal power plants” means something different in the original German, an must be semantically different then “re-opened.” Also note that natural gas is still a fossil fuel that has the dubious distinction of being “better” then coal, but infinitely worse then Nuclear.

    Now if you are against nuclear energy, it means you have to have a replacement in mind and all replacements for Nuclear Power Plants are fossil fuel based. There isn’t another option. Wind/Solar are great, there is no one accusing you of being against renewables. But renewables are NOT replacements for Nuclear or Fossil Fuel based power. So there is your choice. Pro-Nuclear or Pro-Fossil fuel.

    AAA ,

    No already shut down plant has been restarted into operation. Only the grace period until the final shut down has been extended for half a year - only for plants which were scheduled to shut down this year (but haven’t been shut down yet), and only under the condition of the gas emergency status.

    So I upgraded from “pro coal” to “pro fossil fuel” now? Yay. Maybe if we continue this discussion we can also get rid of that narrative.

    argv_minus_one ,

    I mean, in theory, coal burning could be made clean. Capture the carbon out of the exhaust, collect it into a solid block, bury it, done. Problem is the power plants will only pretend to do this, and not actually do it.

    Astroturfed ,

    You’d think the shock of the gas shortage from Russia would of been a wake up call and they’d be ahead of a timeline like this…

    barsoap ,

    Nein!

    gigachad ,

    Doch!

    barsoap ,

    Ohh…

    Quaxamilliom ,
    @Quaxamilliom@hexbear.net avatar

    China still is the ONLY country in the world to have met the super meager Paris Climate Accord goals.

    Amadan ,

    China has absolutely not met the Paris accord goals. Check climate action tracker for a good breakdown of countries policies and actions and the projection it puts them on. No country is anyway close.

    ikilledtheradiostar ,

    nytimes.com/…/cop27-emissions-country-compare.htm…

    archive.is/pUfa6

    New York times reported China is ahead of pledges

    chaorace ,
    @chaorace@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

    … did you link the correct article? It seems quite critical of China’s emissions?

    None of the world’s biggest emitters – China, the United States, the European Union and India – have reduced their emissions enough to meet the Paris Agreement goals.

    Over the past two decades, China’s emissions have surged as the country has developed economically at a breakneck pace. Mainly because of its reliance on coal, one of the highest-emitting fuels, China now accounts for almost a third of all human-caused greenhouse gases — more than the United States, Europe and Japan combined.

    Granted, the article says that China’s emissions are projected to peak in 2025, but that still means emissions are estimated to increase every year for another 3 years. They have not (yet) actually reduced their annual emissions, let alone achieved anything close to net-zero.

    According to projections from Climate Action Tracker and other monitoring organizations, China’s emissions are nearing their peak, years ahead of when China’s government had pledged to reach that goal. Analyses show China’s rate of emissions neither growing nor declining from now until 2025, before gradually dropping off. China’s peak will occur at a far lower per capita emissions level than countries like the United States.

    The goal that China has beaten, it would seem, is their own internal peak date goal. It’s good that they set and kept a goal, but keeping an internal goal is not the same thing as keeping the Paris Accord goals. The Paris Accord represents the bare minimum for avoiding a climate catastrophe and should continue to be the primary bar which we measure countries against.

    ikilledtheradiostar ,

    They literally have a graph showing their paris accord goal as of now, where they as of now, and a 1.5c goal. They and India are ahead.

    Also

    China’s emissions are nearing their peak, years ahead of when China’s government had pledged to reach that goal.

    Every country has different pledge responsibilities it would be drastically unfair to ask more of developing countries to reduce at the same rate as non, especially taking into account the looting the west has done and the offshored emissions on their behalf.

    chaorace , (edited )
    @chaorace@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

    I’m not anti-China. I’m just pro-clarity.

    When someone says “China has absolutely not met the Paris accord goals” and you respond “New York times reported China is ahead of pledges”, it creates the impression that you are correcting the former statement with a contradictory source. The source is not actually contradictory, however, because it explicitly affirms the original point.

    They literally have a graph showing their paris accord goal as of now, where they as of now, and a 1.5c goal. They and India are ahead.

    That is excellent. I’m very pleased to hear this. Perhaps you could share that graph next time instead?

    EDIT: Content warning for the next reply in this comment chain: it contains a prank image featuring pig genitalia and feces. If you’re on desktop, the image is hidden within a collapsed spoiler toggle that you can choose to expand if curious. If you’re on mobile, please know that spoiler tags are not well supported in most apps yet, so this is your opportunity to stop scrolling if you happen to have issues with the described content.

    ikilledtheradiostar ,

    It’s in the article.

    spoilerHow is your reading comprehension so poor? PIGPOOPBALLS___

    chaorace ,
    @chaorace@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

    This graph, correct?

    A graph of China’s emissions over time. It shows three indicators relative to today. The first indicator is China’s projected 2030 emissions (approx. -5%). The second indicator is China’s target 2030 emissions (approx. -3%). The final indicator shows the reduction necessary to achieve the Paris Climate 1.5C 2030 goal (approx. -50%)

    It doesn’t seem much closer to the blue Paris Accord goal compared with any of the other graphs in the same article, as far as I can tell.

    A graph of U.S. emissions over time. It shows three indicators relative to today. The first indicator is the U.S. projected 2030 emissions (approx. -15%). The second indicator is the U.S. target 2030 emissions (approx. -35%). The final indicator shows the reduction necessary to achieve the Paris Climate 1.5C 2030 goal (approx. -65%)A graph of E.U. emissions over time. It shows three indicators relative to today. The first indicator is the E.U. projected 2030 emissions (approx. -15%). The second indicator is the E.U. target 2030 emissions (approx. -35%). The final indicator shows the reduction necessary to achieve the Paris Climate 1.5C 2030 goal (approx. -70%)

    As for India, I don’t see how beating a goal of **+**25% emissions with +20% is any cause for celebration. I actually agree with you and the article when you say that they don’t need to be held to the same standard as fully developed economies, but in that case we probably shouldn’t be talking about them at all when it comes to meeting emissions reduction goals.

    Amadan ,

    Fair enough if we’re going just on pledges on total emissions change by 2030 than China and many other countries like India, Sweden, Denmark and Morocco are in line for the pledges taken. This is just a component of the Paris Accords the main pledge was to take action to limit warming well under 2 degrees. No countries action or policies are in line to meet that pledge. That can be seen in the article you linked showing how far off all four emitters are to 1.5.

    Climate action tracker and the CCPI they put out are the best sources for accurately tracking countries actions. China and pretty much all other countries fall down on their net zero targets rooted in fiction and missing NDC targets.

    UnfortunateShort ,

    I mean, they have only really started since the corrupt right-wing shitheads are not in office anymore. Now we only have to deal with a minister of transport who just refuses to work and claims policies the greens pushed for are his achievement lol

    Uranium3006 ,
    @Uranium3006@kbin.social avatar

    getting rid of nuclear power for russian gas was always a bad idea and this is why

    ExLisper ,

    Hey, Schroeder got paid so it also wasn’t totally bad idea.

    ValiantDust ,

    Except that never happened. Gas is mostly used for heating in Germany, not for electricity like nuclear power. I don’t know where this rumour started (probably somewhere on reddit) but it’s just not true.

    Edit: Just to be clear, I’m not saying that relying so much on Russian gas was a good move or that we couldn’t (and shouldn’t) have done a lot more to move away from coal. But that particular argument is misinformation.

    p1mrx ,

    Electricity could be used for heating (via heat pumps) if Germany had an abundance of clean electricity in the winter.

    ValiantDust ,

    Yes, it could and increasingly is. But that still doesn’t make it true that the nuclear power was replaced by gas.

    p1mrx ,

    You have to look back a few decades to see the whole picture. If we’d kept investing in nuclear technology since the 1980s, with a focus on passive safety and cost reduction, we’d never have needed all that gas in the first place.

    By “we”, I mean the entire western world, not Germany specifically. The fossil fuel companies allegedly encouraged anti-nuclear sentiment during that era, and nobody had the organization and foresight to fight back, so we’re all paying the price today.

    ValiantDust ,

    I don’t really know why you are trying to start a discussion with me because I never argued against any of that. You are right, we could be a lot farther if we had done a lot of things earlier. And it sucks that we aren’t. All of that doesn’t change that the comment I replied to was factually wrong. We could have replaced gas (or coal*) with electricity by using electricity based heating. We did not replace nuclear power with gas.

    Edit: * I wrote coal, I meant oil.

    Uranium3006 ,
    @Uranium3006@kbin.social avatar

    Anti-nuclear is anti environmentalism and the failure to act sooner is on the shoulders of the people who continue to expand fossil fuels and refuse to invest in alternatives

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    That doesn't make any sense. That's like, going to a mechanic and giving them a few million to start an auto business vs going to some random guy, and giving them billions to start an auto business. Sure, eventually it would work out, just by sheer volume of investment, but it's just not feasible. Otherwise governments and private industry would've just done it. That's like saying we should've had the foresight to invest in hydrogen powered cars. Why prioritise that when batteries are easier and cheaper?

    p1mrx ,

    If your goal is reliable carbon-free power, it’s not obvious that renewables will work out. We basically have to build these enormous continent-spanning machines in order to maintain uptime regardless of weather conditions.

    It might be possible in the US and Europe, large regions that will hopefully remain politically stable, but it’s never been done before. By comparison, we have built reliable nuclear power plants. Is it really so obvious who is the mechanic and who is the random guy?

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    It is, I've not seen a single academic study show otherwise. Not the west, nor China, have shown scepticism towards renewables. But there's plenty of that when it comes to the nuclear question. Just look at HPC and SWC in the UK. Companies won't touch it unless the UK government guarantees they make a profit. Not a long term profit. A profit before the project is completed. They want an advance. Then there's the US, over-budget and delayed. Finland, over-budget and delayed. France, over-budger and delayed. EDF prefer their renewables investments than their nuclear ones, mainly because half their nuclear plants are unreliable, and nobody wants to waste more money on them.

    p1mrx , (edited )

    I agree that building wind/solar is currently profitable and reduces emissions. Incremental progress is politically easy.

    I remain skeptical that following this strategy will ever eliminate fossil fuels, because people will turn to them whenever renewables are underperforming. They’ll see the price uncertainty and stick with gas because it works. We won’t demolish the power plants because they’re still needed 10 days a year. The fossil infrastructure will keep on chugging, just at a reduced scale. We’ll eliminate 80% of CO2, and continue to cook ourselves with the last 20%. It’s human nature to lose interest when the problem gets hard. Look how long it’s taking to deploy IPv6, and that’s relatively easy.

    We should invest in the hard problem now, so fission can actually take us carbon-negative in 30 years. Maybe fusion will save the day, but that’s a gamble, and it’s really not that much better than Gen IV fission.

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    Fusion, has been a promise made by nuclear for decades, much like the car industry's promise of green fuels. In the meantime, the university of Stanford semi-regularly updates a paper showing a transition to 100% for the world. It's made possible now, particularly with the innovations done by renewables companies improving efficiency in production, recycling, and AI made available for demand prediction. And we have been investing in nuclear, for many decades. A small kickstart in the renewables industry has built a giant global realistic renewables push. Everyone's happy with renewables. Governments, energy companies, insurance companies. Nuclear will remain a promise and a giant drain on resources.

    notapantsday ,

    We are trying to get more heat pumps installed, but people are still proud of getting a new gas furnace installed in 2023, thus avoiding a potential ban and betting on guaranteed dirt-cheap natural gas for another 20 years.

    But either way, nuclear power is history in Germany and it makes absolutely no sense to bring it back. We never had a lot of nuclear power to begin with and the few power plants that could maybe be reactivated with a ton of money and labor are just a drop in the bucket. Building new reactors takes decades from initial planning to going live and nuclear construction projects are notorious for immense cost overruns. Plus, there are only a few construction companies in the world that have the capabilities to build a nuclear reactor and they’re already tied up in other projects. We would need dozens of new reactors built simultaneously and they would still be finished too late to contribute anything meaningful to a carbon-free electrical grid.

    At the same time, wind energy is a dirt cheap, proven technology that is much more easily deployed, scales really well, is decentralized and reliable. Yes, it can be intermittent but it’s predictable (weather forecasts exist). And if we had invested a fraction of the R&D budget for nuclear fission and fusion into energy storage technology, it would be a complete non-issue. We have some work to do in that regard, but sodium ion batteries are pretty far in development and should be much cheaper. Iron redox flow and liquid metal batteries also have potential, maybe hydrogen. Demand response will also be a big factor. With flexible pricing during the day, both households and businesses can save a lot of money by using more energy whenever there’s a lot of it and less when it’s scarce.

    p1mrx , (edited )

    Your second paragraph could be summed up as: we chose the destination years ago, so there’s no point changing course.

    Will wind and solar will be sufficient to replace all the gas with heat pumps, and keep them running every day in the winter? I would also be hesitant to give up gas heat, without understanding where the replacement electricity will be coming from. “Demand response” means that the rich stay warm, while industry migrates to countries with better price stability… or continued CO₂ emission to avoid those outcomes.

    Perhaps in the end it doesn’t really matter, since the transmission infrastructure for EU-wide renewables will also be useful for buying nuclear from the countries that are investing now.

    notapantsday ,

    Your second paragraph could be summed up as: we chose the destination years ago, so there’s no point changing course.

    Which makes perfect sense when you consider that there’s a deadline, we’ve gone a very long way in one direction and going all the way back to take another route would guarantee missing that deadline.

    It’s like you’re taking your ship from China to Rotterdam, you’re past the Suez canal, in the Mediterranean and now you decide to turn around and go around Africa after all. It really would be idiotic.

    p1mrx ,

    It’s like you’re taking your ship from China to Rotterdam, you’re past the Suez canal, in the Mediterranean and now you decide to turn around and go around Africa after all. It really would be idiotic.

    That decision wouldn’t be idiotic if I actually wanted to go to Africa. It takes even longer to turn around from Rotterdam.

    notapantsday ,

    In my example, ‘Rotterdam’ is supposed to be the ultimate destination, so it would be equivalent to ‘carbon neutrality’. Changing the destination to ‘Africa’ would be the equivalent to just building nuclear power plants for the sake of it, regardless of whether they help us reach carbon neutrality.

    p1mrx ,

    I think the ultimate destination should be carbon neutrality while maintaining a strong industrial base and high standard of living for everyone in the world. Humanity needs to engineer an energy surplus to undo the damage we’ve done, and when one of the richest countries is planning for “demand response”, that doesn’t really inspire much confidence.

    notapantsday ,

    Demand response just means making use of energy surplus. And we’ll have lots of that during spring and summer in the northern hemisphere. Running carbon capture machines only when there’s a surplus is a perfect example of demand response.

    barsoap ,

    maybe hydrogen

    Definitely hydrogen. We need, as in require, it for various things form steel smelting to chemical feedstock, either hydrolysed on-shore or brought in via ammonia tankers, in the country it’s going to be transported via pipelines (part of the network already are getting switched over from natural gas… fun fact Germany’s network started out as a hydrogen network), and those pipelines can store three months of total energy storage (not just electricity). That’s not even including dedicated storage, that’s just high operating pressure vs. low operating pressure. Fraunhofer thinks it’s the best idea since bottled beer.

    notapantsday ,

    Oh yes, no argument there. We’re already using absolutely huge amounts of hydrogen that are mostly made from fossil fuels right now. Worldwide hydrogen production is responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than the entire country of Germany. We’ll have to turn that into green hydrogen and use a ton of renewable energy for that. If we make use of surplus wind and solar, it will help a lot with stabilizing the grid.

    What I was thinking of was the idea of producing hydrogen through electrolysis, storing it and later turning it back into electricity through fuel cells. And I’m not sure if that will ever be cheaper and more efficient than newer and cheaper battery technologies like sodium ion or redox flow batteries.

    barsoap ,

    Cheaper for everyday (and everyseason) operation probably no, but it’s still valuable backup capacity. Differently put you want to subsidise turning hydrogen into electricity just enough that it’s there when you really need it, maybe a task for the network operators. It’s already now the case that gas plants get bought by network operators because they can’t run often enough to turn even half a profit but the network still needs them for stability, and turning natural gas plants into hydrogen plants is nearly trivial (need to exchange burner nozzles, basically, unless a complete idiot designed the plant).

    Now, 50 years down the line all those gas plants might be out of commission and we’ll have fusion but in the mean time, yep there’s going to be at least the capacity to turn hydrogen into electricity.

    salton ,

    Germany doesn’t get all of its electrical power by renewable meness by a long shot. Nuclear plants were prematurely shut down before their end of life while at the same time germanies reliance on fossil fuels went up. This is what everyone is talking about.

    ValiantDust ,

    I just called out this particular piece of misinformation. Being of the opinion that Germany shut down nuclear power plant prematurely doesn’t make it okay to spread misinformation, does it?

    salton ,

    You haven’t shown a single piece of evidence to show that I’m wrong. I can just throw back to you that what your saying is pure missingormation.

    notapantsday ,

    That is just misinformation. First of all, nuclear power never contributed that much anyway. If all nuclear power plants ever built in Germany were running at full load 24/7 for 365 days of the year, they would produce 231 TWh, which is less than 10% of our total energy demand. So there was never that big of a hole to fill in the first place. Especially in the last ten years, when only a handful of power plants were still in service.

    In reality, renewables have managed to replace both nuclear power and a large chunk of fossil fuels (source). Last year we had to export enormous amounts of energy to France, because their nuclear plants had proven so unreliable (source). This has admittedly led to an increased use of fossil fuels, which we could have avoided by building more renewables here (or in France).

    Ooops ,
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    And if you tell that lie annother million times it will become true.

    Really! you just need to nelieve real hard in ti and then reality will adapt and the propaganda hammered into your head will finally become true.

    PatrickYaa ,

    Soooo… Where do the fuel rods for european nuclear power plants come from?

    p1mrx ,

    It’s more interesting to ask where the fuel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_uranium_production come from, given a few years of planning. The energy density is so much higher than gas, that geographical locality doesn’t really matter.

    PatrickYaa ,

    If you’re asking where stuff /could/ come from, why couldn’t we just build renewables. For Germany at least, the ship has sailed anyways. It is not currently legislatively and practically possible to build out the required energy infrastructure with nuclear to phase out gas in a timeframe that makes sense. With the beaureaucracy and everything, it’ll be at least a decade before even the first power plant would be connected to the grid.

    qyron ,

    Not german but I’m in the same continent and in a country that nobody really cares about and we are nearing the threshold where renewables produce more than we require to run the country.

    Funny thing is, private citizens are doing more for that effort alone than government in real terms because saving money is high on the priorities list here and free, renewable energy is a good thing, even more if you can produce it yourself.

    Meanwhile, we’ve been fighting the government to cancel the authorization to log nearly 2000 old growth cork oaks for installing a solar panel farm when we have a lot of room to plant off shore wind farms.

    Nobody really understands what is going on.

    agarorn ,

    Which country?

    qyron ,

    Portugal

    agarorn ,

    Oh nice. Yeah, Portugal runs under the radar here. I found rhis ourworldindata.org/co2/country/portugal

    Seems like you got rid of coal already. Oil/gas seem to hover however. Do you have plans about getting rid of fuel cars? And what do you use gas for? In Germany it’s mostly heating, I would have guessed you don’t need so much heating in Portugal and can use the AC in winter.

    And good look with these oaks, I hate forest being cut down.

    qyron ,

    There a few incentives towards the purchase of eletric cars but its something still way out of reach for the majority of people. But the number of eletric cars is rising.

    Gas is mostly used to run a few eletric generation plants. AC is a doubled edge sword here as houses are poorly insulated and the minimal recommmended power for having an equipment is 10.35Kva, which is a power requirement where all VAT is applied at 23%. The equipments are also very expensive and the installation even more.

    And thank. Lets hope we can make enough noise to have to trees left alone

    notapantsday ,

    cork oaks

    Portugal! What a wonderful country full of wonderful people. We do care about you and your delicious but slightly greasy food.

    qyron ,

    You’ve been eating at the wrong places… that’s a spanish thing: too much olive oil on every dish and too much fat on every cured meat

    NathanielThomas ,

    Churassco chicken is the best chicken I’ve ever had but hard to find in Canada

    qyron , (edited )

    Take notes:

    One chicken, between 1 and 1,5kg (feeds four or two very hungry or one very, very hungry individual)

    Salt and pepper to taste

    Olive oil

    Hot peppers or dried chilli flakes, optional (our local chillis are very strong and we usually avoid putting it into food for children or people that in general don’t tolerate spice)

    two cloves of garlic

    white wine (if it doesn’t smell like you could use it as fuel, you’re good)

    a small bay leaf (or more, it’s your food)

    ==##==

    cut or have your chicken cut open at your local butcher shop; don’t have it cut into pieces! It’s just a cut through the breast to get it flat

    season it with salt and pepper and leave it be

    in a bowl (now comes the tricky part) mix all the other ingredients to make up a marinade; just how much you’ll be making depends if you want to marinate the entire chicken for a few hours (two hours minimum, six to twelve is better, anything up to a week is good; your pick) or just brush the chicken and throw it in the hoven around 180C and go at it with the brush every ten minutes to coat it with the marinade so it roasts without drying. remember to flip your bird occasionally for even cooking.

    I’m not saying you should flip it the bird but if that works for you, be my guest; swearing at and cursing the food while cooking is kinda of traditional here. Maybe it adds some extra dimension to the end result? Try it and let me know or don’t and leave it at that.

    Keep in mind you need more wine than olive oil in the marinade as the chicken will be cooking with the skin on and you want to render the fat in the skin and have it crisp for eating. Wine provides moisture and flavor, olive oil aids in crisping up and adhere the seasonings to the meat. Whisk everything with a fork (it further bruises the chopped garlic, chillis and the bay leaf and releases more flavour).

    You’ll require less liquid if you are not marinading the meat; if you are, you’ll require enough liquid to drown the bird in it. Also, marinade it in the fridge to avoid spoilage, especially if it is going to be a long dip.

    You can cook it in the hoven or you can cook it over hot coals. Both works but I’m not going to lie to you and say it’s the exact same thing because it isn’t: the smoke adds to the final taste.

    Goes well with a nice chopped salad (lettuce, tomato, white onion and cucumber, a pinch of coarse salt, olive oil and vinegar), boiled potatoes (get some small potatoes, wash it well, keep the skin on and throw a garlic clove and a bay leaf into the cooking water) and a nice red wine. Lemonade, ice tea or a soft drink for those who don’t drink goes fine as well, as long as it is not overwhelming sweet.

    Hope this is of any use to you.

    argv_minus_one ,

    Easy mistake, isn’t it? Spain is next door.

    qyron ,

    From Spain, we don’t get neither good winds nor good weddings…

    It’s tiresome. We, as a nation, exist for longer. Our language, culture, traditions, manerisms, etc, are different. We are not a part of Spain and we are not their bretheren, unlike many like to tell.

    Our first king mother was a spanish woman and he decided to leave home by waging war on his mother, kill her lover and burn the lands where they lived.

    So, it is understandable we dislike to be overlooked or mistaken as spanish

    notapantsday ,

    I just remember a sandwich covered in melted cheese with an egg on top and some kind of sauce. And a lot of delicious fried food. Both usually with fries as a side dish. Never any salad unless I specifically ordered it. I’m sure I could have gone to lots of restaurants where they would have had lighter meals, but I was on holiday so greasy was perfect.

    qyron ,

    Francesinha.

    You can get those swimming in a pool of fat and you can get it very lean and clean.

    You’ve been to Porto, right?

    The make or break for that dish is the sauce. Some people can make it very heavy and some are capable of making it very light. Just know the amount of booze it goes in it could fuel a small plane.

    Then comes the cheese and some places just overdo it. Four or five thin slices are enough but I do know some places throw half a block over every sandwhich.

    I apologise for the fries. That’s fast food influence. And the egg was unexpected; that’s an addition from the croque madame.

    Hope you had fun here.

    IWantToFuckSpez ,

    Wow what a surprise, guess brown coal isn’t good for the climate. Bunch of idiots those German politicians. They even tried to weaken that EU bill that bans the sale of new fossil fuel cars.

    elouboub ,
    @elouboub@kbin.social avatar

    Voted in by German citizens.

    DrWeevilJammer ,
    @DrWeevilJammer@lemmy.ml avatar

    Who have been subjected to targeted information warfare/propaganda for years.

    UnfortunateShort ,

    And also, people straight up lie and deceive.

    It’s a very, veeery good thing the fucking CDU was voted out. No matter how much you hate the current government for one reason or another, at least they do something besides shoveling money into their pockets and maintaining status quo.

    We’ll see whether their ideas work out, but at least they have some.

    notapantsday ,

    I had high hopes for the current government, but I never imagined the FDP would be able to do so much damage with so few votes. The way it is now, I’m pretty disappointed. A lot of great ideas that were just shut down in their infancy.

    Sodis ,

    It’s not just the FDP though, Scholz is at least complicit with their bullshit. It is beyond me, how the SPD supports whatever Wissing does in the transportation department.

    notapantsday ,

    The fact that Scholz didn’t even come to my mind when I thought about the German government says it all. I had no expectations and I was still disappointed.

    elouboub ,
    @elouboub@kbin.social avatar

    Awww, poor German people. Never learned to think for themselves. Just learned how to follow orders.

    Ooops , (edited )
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    You don't realize how incredible funny (or sad.. depending on perpective) it is to see people like you parrot the same lie spoon-fed to you by lobbyists again and again while talking about other being too stupid to think.

    This incredible post-factual world where popular narrative trumps reality is truely lost...

    elouboub ,
    @elouboub@kbin.social avatar

    Lol, what an egoistic view of the world. "Everybody else is to blame but me". It's all those lobbyists, immigrants, bankers, politicians, nazis, antifa, that boogeyman over there! But me? Nah, I'm perfect and all my friends and family never do anything wrong. In fact, anybody who I can identify with is globally right.

    Now that's sad.

    PipedLinkBot ,

    Here is an alternative Piped link(s): piped.video/watch?v=07w9K2XR3f0

    Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.

    I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.

    Ooops , (edited )
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    Yes, it looks egoistic if you are this deluded as you are.

    But we have real problems to solve and can't save every propaganda victim that refuses to accept reality because you run on the usual hateful narrative about Germany. Hey, I don't even blame you. Telling a lie about Germany any time you need to divert from some own issue is a well honored tradition in Europe (and thus wide-spread in media) and so I understand that you were trained to follow that pattern. It's sad (or funny... I still haven't decided...) none-the-less.

    So you can cry about those imaginary egoistic Germans of yours all you want. The actual ones are massively building up renewables, are -contrary to your beloved lies- on a historic low in coal use. And this report is actually about the transport and construction sectors not matching their emission reduction goals (while sectors liker energy or industry -the actual sources of coal use- are easily fullfilling theirs... but that's not mentioned because -as I said before- energy and industry are not even remotely the topic of this report.)

    argv_minus_one ,

    What makes you think that person only thinks poorly of German low-information voters? Low-information voters are a plague around the world.

    Ooops ,
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    What makes you think that person only thinks poorly of German low-information voters?

    His comments right here in this comment chain I answered to?

    "Voted in by German citizens."
    "Awww, poor German people. Never learned to think for themselves. Just learned how to follow orders."

    Call me biased but explicitly calling out Germans in two comments in a row is a good indicator for that he is talking about.

    argv_minus_one ,

    Well, yeah, because we’re talking about Germany. In other discussions, where it is my country and not Germany that’s being discussed, there are plenty of similar comments.

    Sodis ,

    Hey, the FDP has the most ambitious climate policies of all parties! At least so they said.

    agarorn ,

    Luckily we will get rid of coal soon.

    notapantsday ,

    I hope so…

    Alto ,
    @Alto@kbin.social avatar

    Hopefully they wake up to reality and follow Sweden's approach

    elouboub ,
    @elouboub@kbin.social avatar

    Once it becomes more profitable to betray oil, gas, and coal companies, it'll happen. Not a moment sooner.

    Alto ,
    @Alto@kbin.social avatar

    Unfortunately we'll already be doomed long before that happens

    elouboub ,
    @elouboub@kbin.social avatar

    It's a party then?

    explodicle ,

    Unless something “unfortunate” were to happen that might impact profitability.

    agarorn ,

    What is Swedens approach?

    p1mrx ,

    thelocal.se/…/swedish-government-unveils-plan-to-…

    agarorn ,

    I can’t read it, as the website doesn’t like my adblocker. The first few sentences talked about nuclear.

    I found this showing that in 1991 1/3 of your total energy came from nuclear, which is super impressive, now it is down to 1/5. Do is your plan to double that number again? And what is your current time-frame for that?

    ourworldindata.org/energy/country/sweden?country=…

    p1mrx ,

    I’m not from Sweden, but they currently have 6.8 GW of nuclear.

    From the article: “Climate Minister Romina Pourmokhtari said […] that the government believed that new nuclear power equalling 10 conventional reactors would need to go into service in the 2030s and 2040s.”

    Assuming that a conventional reactor is around 1 GW, adding 10 would more than double their current capacity.

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    It took Finland nearly two decades to complete Scandinavia's newest reactor. Sweden can remove the cap, but good luck finding private companies willing to invest in that. Not without guaranteed profits and subsidies. Of course Sweden could just build it themselves. But it's not cheap.

    p1mrx ,

    Yeah, nuclear is quite expensive, just like batteries, hydrogen, and long-distance transmission are expensive. The effects of climate change will be incredibly expensive. The best way to make technology cheaper is to build a lot of it, and just building something is step one.

    johnnyb ,

    and building lots of solar and wind farms is cheaper and faster than nuclear, so what?!

    p1mrx ,

    Because building lots of solar and wind farms is not sufficient. You also need stuff like batteries, hydrogen, and long-distance transmission to make the grid reliable without fossil fuels.

    Though it seems like Europe overall is planning for enough diversity that the nuclear countries can sell to neighbors in times of shortage. Hopefully some US states will make similar plans.

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    Usually it's renewables that's sold over the border rather than nuclear energy. Also, nuclear and batteries, for example, are not comparable. Batteries have an ROI of less than three years. It'll be profitable long before nuclear is even constructed. That's presuming private companies are interested in them. Are you aware of a single nuclear power plant, anywhere in the world, that is unsubsidised? Or even an insurance company that's willing to insure a plant in full? Usually not, usually it's subsidised by the government, with guarantees of profitability to private companies, and at least partially insured and decommissioned by the government. Because nobody wants anything to do with nuclear. Not even nuclear companies. EDF's renewables part of the company, is subsidising the nuclear side. On top of all this, studies are clear on what is faster and more effective at reducing emissions.

    p1mrx ,

    Renewables are sold over the border more because they are naturally geographically distributed. I want to see nuclear on the grid as a power source of last resort, so we can destroy the fossil fuel infrastructure, yet keep civilization running if a volcano blocks out the sun or climate change turns the deserts cloudy, or who knows what the future holds.

    Fossil fuels are incredibly subsidized, both explicitly and through unpriced externalities. If we must subsidize the alternative, then so be it. Nuclear should get cheaper as we build more.

    Most nuclear plants today will melt down if left unattended. That’s pretty stupid. We should let engineers make them orders of magnitude safer, with passive air cooling or huge water reserves, so they can be insured at reasonable cost. There is no shortage of ideas on that front.

    Ooops , (edited )
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    It's actually the opposite. Just look at France. They are massively overproducing most of the time, even when they run checkups and maintenance on a lot of their plants in summer, they have huge amounts to export. And yet they still need imports in the coldest weeks of winter (while even winter on average sees overproduction).

    So no, nuclear countries will not sell any power in times of shortage. They will be the ones needing imports from countries with storage. Or they need to start up storage themselves, too. Because enough nuclear base load to survive the few weeks with high demand without imports or storage when your renewable half of production is underperforming is insanely expensive. As it means having a lot of overproduction the rest of the time... but with no market to export anymore like they have today, because all countries will have high demand and low supply in the same time frames.

    (Speaking about France: Their grid provider ran a big study about future electricity production. And the only reason nuclear (even more than the minimal required base load) was economically viable was because they plan with hydrogen production all year. For industry, for export (because -as I said- they need a way to export when not everyone has high production but low demand) and as storage...)

    PS: Yes, the conclusion is that nuclear needs storage to be economicaslly viable. Just like they need a lot of complementing renewables. But don't tell that to the nuclear cult pretending storage is impossible and renewables don't work, because their heads might explode. Wait... Do tell it to them, as these exploding heads would be an improvement.

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    Wholesale power prices are cheaper in Germany than they are in France. Last year France had to shut down half their reactors for maintenance and weather. Germany had to export to them. Before the French government bailed out the nuclear industry again, there was talk of splitting up EDF from their profitable renewables investments, away from its loss-making nuclear problem. EDF's CEO resigned because of the vast cost of the UK's HPC nuclear plant. And now, under agreement with the UK government, EDF can make a profit from HPC without it actually being constructed with their RAB model.

    Ooops ,
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    The usual fantasizing about nuclear and failing any actual plan, very popular right now. Because nuclear lobbyists pay well.

    Or more precise: They want to build more nuclear power. But of course all their planned and their existing nuclear combined will not even be remotely enough to cover just the minimal required base load in a few decades. Because changing most of our primary energy demand (industry, heating, transport in varying shares) to electricity (that is often only making up 20%+ in a lot of countries) will massively increase the demand.

    If you are not building (or planning to start the build-up very, very soon) enough nuclear capacity to cover 80% or more of today's electricity demand then you will not have the minimal base load required in 2-3 decades, because there will be an increase by at least a factor of 2,5 in demand.

    But that's not something you tell people as nobody has a clue how to pay for building even more nuclear (where "even more" means the actual needed amount)...

    (A few exceptions with massive hydro potential aside -as they have access to that cheaper base load- there is exactly one country with a plan that works mathematically: France. And even their government is lying to their people when they talk about 6 new reactors with another 8 optional. Because the full set of 14 is the required minimum they will need in 2050 and onward (their old ones are not in a state to run mcuh longer than that).

    But hey. Even the most pro-nuclear country and the one with a domestic indutry actually doing a lot of the nuclear build up for other countries can't tell their population the trutz about costs and minimla requirements. If you want to know just onme thing about the state of nuclear, that this should be it.

    PowerCrazy ,

    Who the fuck are paying nuclear lobbyist? Do they even exist? Like is “Big Nuclear” real? Can I get a job there? I’d love to get paid a shit load to go to the same dinners fossil fuel executives go to, but I’d get to actually advocate for something worthwhile and that would improve life in the future.

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    Yeah, it genuinely is. Doesn't take too long to find the lobby groups. A lot of funding comes from mining. Also, RAB funding (from the government) allows nuclear companies to earn a profit without having the plant completed yet. So there is money to be made. Ever wonder why there's a lot of pro-nuke videos on YouTube? Rather than academic spaces? Which time and again shows you that renewables are superior in virtually every way?

    johnnyb ,

    yeah sure, nuclear powerplants finished in the late 40th are gonna solve our current problems (if that’s the approach you are talking about)

    Alto ,
    @Alto@kbin.social avatar

    Sure as fuck better than setting targets you know you're not going to hit and then acting all shocked when you don't

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    Is it though? You'd need to cut the price of nuclear by about 1/4. Even then, renewables are faster at decarbonisation. Not that nuclear represented a large amount of the German grid in the first place. Best case scenario for Germany, is extending the lifespan of their plants not more than a few years.

    Alto ,
    @Alto@kbin.social avatar

    Sitting here and complaining about how long it'll take once we start, and as such never actually starting, is exactly how we got here.

    Best time was 40 years ago, second best time is now.

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    It's actually the worst time to get started on nuclear. Costs keep going up. There's a reason why countries overwhelmingly prefer to invest in renewables over nuclear. This includes nuclear companies. EDF is one of the largest investors in renewables, and it's actually the profitable side of the business. It's going to be the taxpayer that's going to pay for nuclear, and they're not going to get their money's worth, as opposed to renewables.

    Alto ,
    @Alto@kbin.social avatar

    This just in, when you arbitrarily raise the barrier of entry to a market, the price goes up.

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    You can't go cheap on nuclear. Otherwise you're looking at a myriad of political corruption and safety concerns, which in part will cost you a government, where you'll eventually have to start all over again. Or you could just invest in renewables. Like what China is overwhelmingly doing.

    Ooops ,
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    But that's excactly not was it happening. Keeping the remaining reactors alive (they provided ~2,6% of the generated electricity btw...) just for the sake of keeping them would have slowed down renewables (as those old reactors are definitely not fit to adapt to fluctuations well) and would also have bound a lot of money then missing for renewables and infra-structure (why upgrade the grid to better renewable fluctuations when the reactors can't anyway).

    So they actually start right now and massively so to build up renewables and the matching infra-structure. Unlike countries with alleged nuclear plans, that all still plan to start building soon™ and in most cases not even close to the actual required numbers for the projected demand in two decades+. Because completely decarbonising transport, industry and heating means a massive increase in electricity demand as we basically shift all primary energy demand over to electricity. Yes, in some cases electrity will be more efficient and will save some energy. But we are still talking about all primary energy, with electricity today often only making up 20-25% of the primary energy demand in most countries today.

    PS: But yes, if you want to build nuclear. Start today. But do it on a scale that you will be actually able to cover the minimal required base load of your projected electricity demand in 2050+... Fun fact: No country actually does. They all just pretend and actually sit the problem out for someone else by loudly planning nuclear but not in amounts that make sense mathematically. France is basically the only country with a somewhat reasonable plan. When they scrap the "8 optional reactors" bullshit and build the bull set of 14. That's their required baseload. And they will need to keep their aging fleet functional until the majority of them are build. They will also not be trivial.

    Ooops ,
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    The targets got missed by construction (some small part) and transport (mainly)... and again like clockwork the brain-washed nuclear brigade storms in lying about electricity production.

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    Sweden's approach is over.

    They have no targets, the industry isn't interested, and the government's analysis has been based on nothing.

    https://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/a/Q70mzQ/regeringen-svanger-om-karnkraftsreaktorerna

    https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-08-01/uniper-dents-swedish-nuclear-hopes-with-firm-no-to-new-plants

    queermunist ,
    @queermunist@lemmy.ml avatar

    What a fucking joke. It’s amazing how all these countries set weak goals for themselves and then fail anyway.

    We’re all going to die lol

    CrabAndBroom ,

    The UK likes to go the other way by talking up a ridiculous goal and then immediately failing it, like "Our goal is to produce zero CO2 and become the global leader in renewables by 2025” and then immediately open a new coal mine.

    SheeEttin ,

    That’s basically what Germany did. They recently shut down their nuclear plants and restarted their coal plants.

    agarorn ,

    And yet coal power production is practically at the lowest level ever (except for corona months 03/20 and 04/20)

    energy-charts.info/charts/energy/chart.htm?l=de&a…

    dot20 ,

    It should be 0.

    Zippy ,

    Germany is now using coal as base load. The main reason coal has not increased considerably is because all this new generation and loss of nuclear baseload along with limited ng generation has resulted in average energy prices doubling from 2017 to 2021 prices. Simply put the cost of energy is now so high that people and industry is using less. Done large industries shut down with loss of jobs. Solar and wind had been very expensive even with government subsidies. Subsidies that take money out of government coffers resulting in less services. This ignoring the increase in energy importation of which some may be from coal generation.

    Shutting down nuclear simply denied millions of people a clean energy source unless they were willing to pay nearly double that of past years.

    reuters.com/…/germany-goes-all-energy-transition-….

    derGottesknecht ,

    You know that with merit order pricing the cost of electricity only depended on the cost of the most expensive producer? So nuclear plants have close to 0 Influence on the price.

    BastingChemina ,

    Germany still has a very long way to go to be carbon neutral.

    Almost 79% of its primary energy consumption is fossil fuel. 17% is renewable.

    For comparison in France 46% of the primary energy consumption is fossil fuel, 14% renewable and 40% nuclear.

    Arcturus ,
    @Arcturus@kbin.social avatar

    Look at the industry's growth in France though. Renewables has been growing at the expense of nuclear. This is happening in Germany as well.

    notapantsday ,

    That is just blatant misinformation. Name one single coal plant that has been restarted since nuclear power was phased out.

    SheeEttin ,

    www.dw.com/en/…/a-62893497

    The Mehrum plant in Hohenhameln and the Heyden plant in Petershagen (whose operation has been extended).

    Unless your nitpick is that these were started before the final nuclear shutdown, but I never said otherwise, only that both things happened recently.

    Grimpen ,

    I understood it as coal was phased in as nuclear was phased out. The thing that astounds me still though is how recent the last 3 were shut down.

    SheeEttin ,

    I think they were planning on natural gas, but that went down the tubes because they were planning on buying from Russia. Coal plants were restarted to fill the gap.

    What the plan is now, I don’t know.

    Sodis ,

    The end goal was always renewables with smart net, storage and hydrogen plants to offset spikes. Gas prices are dropping again, so it will be used as a bridging solution. Energy production in Germany is actually on track of its climate goals compared to transportation.

    notapantsday ,

    They were extended specifically because of natural gas supply issues, caused by the war in Ukraine. Not because of nuclear shutdowns.

    Ooops ,
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    Wow... Where have I read that lie before? Oh, yeah. 20 times in this thread already, because you all get your alternative reality sppon-fed by the same lobbyists.

    Actual reality:

    The "massive" amount of nuclear shut down

    The "coal" that replace nuclear

    The actual historic low of coal use

    shapesandstuff ,

    The actual problem was stopping to fund solar, smashing a hundred thousand jobs in renewables under the pretense of “saving workers”. ~20k jobs in coal heroically saved.

    Ooops ,
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    But they could easily do it (and get paid by fossil fuel lobbyists) because the discussion is completely twisted anyway. And most constructive discussion of the topic will be drowned in fairy tales about renewables not working, nuclear being our only savior and other bullshit.

    Basically this whole thread is a perfect example. We discuss electricity production because that's the direction the nuclear social media cult is pushing every discussion into...

    The actual report linked in this thread is for a German report of construction and traffic sectors not meeting their emission reduction goals... and I'm pretty sure neither coal nor nuclear is used to power cars nowadays. And the electrification bottle neck for transport is the production pace of electric cars, their still too high prize, limits on loading infra-structure etc., not actually energy per se.

    derGottesknecht ,

    Thank you for debunking this nuclear fanboy bullshit that gets repeated all the time.

    Samsy ,

    Yes, but the goals in germany are written into a law, and the highest council actually blaming the government for failed goals.

    Gosplan14_the_Third ,
    @Gosplan14_the_Third@hexbear.net avatar

    The government has more interest in pursuing the global power ambitions of the Standort Deutschland rather than accomplishing environmental goals, even in spite of one of the parties being named Die Grünen (which is basically just good PR for them and nothing of substance) - and the goals that are being pursued anyway are all to the slogan of Cem Özdemir “Zwischen Wirtschaft und Umwelt gehört kein oder”. Environmentalism as long as it remains profitable, even at costs of +2, +2,5, +3 or more °C

    The next elections are sure to be won by Merz, with or without the AfD, and very likely to have the FDP in influential ministries, so nothing will change - or perhaps even for the worse.

    That’s what happens when the main goal of production is not the goal of creating socially necessary goods, but to insert money into the labor process and end up with more than you had at the beginning.

    Ooops ,
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    Sure... the once-again-below-5%-party will get influential ministries. And the Greens totally did not manage to meet their climate goals in agricultur and industry, both huge causes for emmisions. Oh, wait. They by far surpassed them. Soemthing you cannot say about traffic (FDP) or construction (SPD).

    But yeah, I know. Brain-damage doesn't allow you to not parrot the popular fairy tales of the German right wing media, we get dwoned in on adaily basis for nearly two years now, just once.

    Let me guess... you also totally believe the popular fantasy of the Greens losing voters in droves (actual ~0-0,1% since the election) because that's the narratives spoon-fed to you with weeks of rediculous talk about the Green's reaching a new low constantly... while their coalition partners actually lost 33-40% of their respective voters since the election.

    quatschkopf34 ,

    Still not gonna change a damn thing. The (federal) government(s) don’t care, they are busy framing harmless protesters as potential terrorists and jailing them accordingly. Or they simply change the law again so that they do not have to be held accountable for their missed goals (see the ministry for transport).

    AntiOutsideAktion ,
    @AntiOutsideAktion@hexbear.net avatar

    The kind of law where people go to jail or the kind of law people have long televised meetings and write op eds?

    hoshikarakitaridia ,

    German here.

    Even back under Merkel, elected parties had a habit of defining good goals and then rendering them impossible to hit through policy. This meant that no one could fault them for trying, and no one could fault them for not being able to hit them.

    Nowadays my countrymen aren’t as stupid anymore. That doesn’t mean we can do anything about it, but especially since Merkel we don’t believe any of these leaks anymore.

    shapesandstuff ,

    Good ol CDU turning almost everything they touched into steaming horseshit

    PsychedSy ,

    We’ll be fine. We’re gonna throw some reflective particulate into the atmosphere or some shit.

    queermunist ,
    @queermunist@lemmy.ml avatar

    We’ll drop a giant ice cube into the ocean, solving the problem once and for all!

    PsychedSy ,

    You kid, but we’re not gonna get greenhouse gases under control. We’re gonna find a way to stabilize temps and kick the can down the road to the next issue co2 causes.

    queermunist ,
    @queermunist@lemmy.ml avatar

    That’s fallacious reasoning.

    Just because climate engineering is the only way to stabilize temperatures doesn’t actually mean it can be done. That’s all hypothetical tech, just like carbon capture and other fairy tales we tell ourselves to cope with the reality of the end of the fucking world.

    I’ll tell you what will happen. We won’t do anything to stop or slow climate change and we’ll reach a tipping point, after which society will rapidly collapse into warring factions and any hope of stabilizing the climate will be gone until we have a nuclear winter reset.

    NathanielThomas ,

    We can’t even agree the world is overpopulated let alone stop our bullshit.

    We’re all going to die horrible deaths and it’s going to be well-deserved hubris.

    derGottesknecht ,

    Overpopulation is a cop out, we could supply even more people. Its more an issue with greed and inequality that causes the problems instead of overpopulation

    PsychedSy ,

    It doesn’t mean it can be done, but it might.

    derGottesknecht ,

    Didn’t you hear him? ONCE AND FOR ALL!!!

    PsychedSy ,

    Por que no los dos?

    derGottesknecht ,

    because of this

    PipedLinkBot ,

    Here is an alternative Piped link(s): piped.video/watch?v=0SYpUSjSgFg

    Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.

    I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.

    jabjoe ,
    @jabjoe@feddit.uk avatar

    I’m much more optimistic, though I do think it will get worse before it gets better. I think we’ll end up with a few mass killer enviromental events before humans start to save themselves properly. It’ll never be too late as Earth is always going to better than anywhere else for us.

    Quick list of things hopeful in my feeds of the top of my head.

    • Renewable energy is the cheapest energy.
    • Agrivoltaics can increase yeilds while also providing power.
    • Home Solar & battery pay back time is coming down all the time.
    • Electric cars are the cheapest over their life time and the upfront costs are tumbling.
    • Electrification of more and more transport types is happening to save costs.
    • EVs are going V2H/V2G/V2X which means you get a large home (and office?) battery to take part in energy markets.
    • Second life EV batteries will eventury be a source of larger, cheaper, home batteries.
    • Just the other day another methane solution : theguardian.com/…/bacteria-that-eats-methane-coul…
    • Fusion looks closer than 50 years out now.
    • RightToRepair + OpenSource is slowly spreading and will reduce life time costs and reduce e-waste. Regulators are waking up too.
    • Vertical farming is developing and will end up cheaper.
    • Lab meat or precision fermentation is a path to animal free animal protein at lower costs.
    • 5 minute cities as an idea is spreading.
    • Covid has normalized WFH
    • Green spaces in cities to cool them and improve mental health is increasingly being talked about and pushed in some forward thinking cities.
    • Peak population is constantly revised down and sooner. Once population starts to fall, it’s not set to stop for a long time.

    There is a lot of movement. It’s all about aligning economics with fighting climate change. Which is natural as using less to do the same thing is better for both.

    One thing that is a very good sign is oil companies are scared. They are spending a lot of money pumping out FUD. Doom peddling to slow climate action, but economics is against them. Even without climate damage being costed in. Which governments will do when oil is less powerful.

    Fight the doom!

    Tankiedesantski ,

    Some of the things you listed are indeed good, but we’re not going to avert climate catastrophe unless we reject the idea that we can only do good things if they’re less expensive than the bad thing alternative.

    jabjoe ,
    @jabjoe@feddit.uk avatar

    I think it’s the way to ease the masses in. You also missing that the other end is to make the bad stuff expensive. Bring environmental cost on to the balance sheet. Criminalize and enforce those laws, environmental crimes. Carrot and stick.

    Ooops ,
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    There's also a lot of propaganda paid by fossil fuel lobbyists (and some nuclear lobbyists still going for the perceived easy target of renewables, as rediculous as it is...) with the goal to disrupt the energy transition.

    And the majority here actually believes they are anti-fossil fuels while they actually parrot their propaganda (for example the "Germany stopped nuclear power to burn more coal"-fairy tale you can read a hundred times by now here - only invented for the talking point of coal being needed, when Germany is actually at a historic low in use) and thus constantly running (objectively wrong) talking points against renewable power.

    On one hand I love the obvious panic of fossil fuel lobbyists getting more desperate and rediculous in their massaging by the day. On the other hand, they already brain-washed a massive amount of people that I fear are really lost and will fight tooth and nails against a reasonable green transition to pursue their fantasies of "sane" nuclear build-up (that isn't sane because nobody is actually building enough capoacities to make sense mathematically), without that "non-working" storage (that nuclear power actually needs to be economically viable) and "expensive" renewables (same, same...).

    jabjoe ,
    @jabjoe@feddit.uk avatar

    You get it. But at the end of the day, the fossil fuel companies will lose because of economics. Renewable energy and electrification is cheaper and better and planet saving. There will be economic feedback loops kicking in as less fuel is used, taking up the price.

    Ooops ,
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    But "in the end" isn't fast enough for my taste... or for the taste of people losing their homes or base of life to floods, draughts, forest fires and so on.

    And it won't even get better but just worse even if we stopped co2 emission completely today. We would have need that feedback loop a decade ago. Instead the same lobbyists now sabotaging it got a lot of renewables killed the moment they were too cheap to compete.

    If you draw a curve of deployed solar and wind power, the last decade is a hole that basically threw us back more than the missed time even.

    And even if renewables take over for economicla reasons now, they will just change tactic and instead sabotage storage and infrastructure to keep fossil fuels relevant.

    Germany had a very coal heavy power prodcution originally and massively build up renewables... and the lobbyists were already ahead... they blocked grid extensions to create pockets depending on coal no matter how much cheap green electricity is available. They blocked grid extensions to make diversification less effective. They -also for that reason- pushed antiwind sentiments in one part of the country and anti-solar in another. They made storage commercially unviable by massive double taxation (once as an end consumer while loading, then as a producer while unloading).

    And they did all that basically without anyone taking much notice because they also -and much more visible- blocked wind and solar power in general (ffs... they killed a 100k people industry and sold it off to China just because solar was getting too cheap).

    Yes, renewables are extremely cheap. So cheap in fact that people fight for their chance to build solar and wind in designated areas instead of wanting subsidies like for other power production. But if we don't take a very close and constant look, we will be surprised in a decade how all those renewables did not actually help reduce co2 much as the 10-year-infrastructure plans for storage and grid are suddenly about lagging 9 years behind. Just look at such basic projects like the north-south grid connection in Germany. The 10-year plan to build SüdLink is scheduled to be done in ~6 years now... after 12 years. 100% sponsored by conservative local politicians and conservative nimbys cosplaying as environmentalists.

    jabjoe ,
    @jabjoe@feddit.uk avatar

    Never give up hope. That’s what fossil fuels companies want.

    In 2005 me and my now wife watched “Who Killed the electric car” and it felt hopeless. Now we both drive EVs and you see more and more of them on the road. Home solar used to be a pipe dream, but now I know more people with it and hope to set it up myself. My electricity provider claims 100% renewables. We plan to remove gas use from the house.

    Germany will hurt itself by not looking forwards, and as that becomes more and apparent, it will be harder to maintain. Fossil fuel money will start to reduce and with that, it’s corruption of politics and information. At some point, I hope some jail time is handed out to those who knowing slowly climate against for money. Now, climate action and money are more and more lined up. Always have been long term, but now short term too. Aligned on energy and thus everything down stream of energy. Which a lot of stuff!

    Australia’s Teals movement shows common sense can win out.

    Sodis ,

    The goal is complete decarbonization until 2045 and a lot of sectors in Germany are already on track with that goal, energy being one of them. That with a minister of finance, that does not want to spend money and a minister of transportation, that is more a puppet of the automobile industry and does not care about decarbonization. Imagine the US without the huge subsidies into clean energy. That’s what Germany is trying to do under their current minister of finance.

    Iceblade02 ,

    Energy or electricity? Those are two very different things.

    Sodis ,

    Sorry, that was imprecise. The correct German term would be Energiewirtschaft, that can be translated to energy industry. That’s not only electricity, but also production of biogas, district heating, refining of fossil fuels and so on. The struggling departments from worst to slightly struggling are: -transportation: widespread use of fossil fuels -building: heating with fossil fuels and emissions from concrete -industry: high use of energy and no alternative to fossil fuels in some cases

    Iceblade02 ,

    Great that the plan is for the entire economy. Cheap and reliable clean electricity is possibly the most important and straightforward(ish) issue to solve with steel and concrete sitting at the opposite end of the spectrum.

    I_Has_A_Hat ,

    It’s amazing how all these countries set weak goal

    It’s can kicking. Make a promise for something 25 years in the future. Who cares if the country can’t meet it? You’ll likely be out of office or retired by that point. That’s the next person’s problem.

    Kuori ,
    @Kuori@hexbear.net avatar

    That’s the next person’s problem.

    it is until people start getting organized and seeking justice on those responsible

    ininewcrow ,
    @ininewcrow@lemmy.ca avatar

    We’re all going to die lol

    I agree … but that attitude also encourages people, especially leaders … and especially the billionaires that control this world … to believe that destruction is the ultimate end and to just play along, pick up as much wealth as possible while you can and do whatever you please because the end is near.

    queermunist , (edited )
    @queermunist@lemmy.ml avatar

    As if billionaires needed more reasons to pick up as much wealth as possible while they can lol

    GivingEuropeASpook ,
    @GivingEuropeASpook@lemm.ee avatar

    Well duh? Are they nationalizing all carbon emitting industries to begin a managed decline of the industry or are they hoping economic magic and wishful thinking will work?

    SeventyTwoTrillion ,
    @SeventyTwoTrillion@hexbear.net avatar

    they’re turning their coal power plants back on after shutting down their nuclear power plants. oh, and planning on converting existing natural gas pipelines to carry hydrogen instead… likely generated by natural gas.

    eltimablo ,

    Natural gas is a byproduct of gasoline refining, so I'd rather see it converted to hydrogen than have it get burned, whether for use or disposal.

    Ooops , (edited )
    @Ooops@kbin.social avatar

    Sure... they turn up coal power to result in the lowest coal use ever.

    Just like they shut down reactors that produced laughable 2,6% of all electricity that year, yet those reactors (ones that were replaced by renewables even) could have single-handedly reduced their emissions by massive amounts.

    Just like they never actually used more than a few percent of gas in electricity production (because they only use gas as short-time peak burners to compensate supply/demand spikes and that's really expensive even when gas was cheap) but somehow were so completely dependent on gas to not sit in the dark that they started to burn even more coal... again while actually massively reducing coal.

    I don't know if it's magic or advanced quantum mechanics allowing them to do the polar opposite of the popular narratives every single time...

    ...or you are just brain-washed to believe every lie about Germany again and again. Hmm... No, that sounds unrealistic. It's probalby the magic thing.

    Cobrachicken ,

    Well not a bad idea tbh, as most state owned and controlled companies tend to go belly up.

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