https://www.smart-energy.com/renewable-energy/germany-renewables-up-to-43-coal-emissions-down-in-2019-report/
Germany renewables up to 43%, coal emissions down in 2019 – report
Jan 16, 2020
Greenhouse gas emissions in Germany fell by more than 50 million tonnes
in 2019; emissions now stand at 35% below their 1990 levels, and
Germany’s goal of achieving a 40% emissions reduction by 2020 is thus
within reach, according to tink tank Agora Energiewende.
The power sector is solely responsible for this decline in emissions, as
significantly less electricity was generated using hard coal and
lignite, while generation from renewables rose to cover 42.6% of
electricity demand, a nearly 5% point increase over 2018.
Notably, last year marked the first year in which generation from wind,
hydro, solar and biogas plants exceeded the total generation from coal
and nuclear.
Higher certificate prices in the EU emissions trading system have been
the major driver of lower power sector emissions. In combination with
increased electricity production from renewables and lower electricity
consumption, higher emissions prices led fossil-fuel power plants to
significantly reduce their electricity production during many hours in
2019, as their generation was not price competitive.
Power generation by hard coal-fired power plants dropped by 31%, and
that of lignite-fired power plants by 22%. Lower coal-based generation
also benefited natural gas-fired power plants, which require fewer
emission certificates to generate power; natural gas-based generation
increased by 11%.
In sharp contrast to the progress made in the power sector, emissions in
the building and transport sectors increased in 2019.
The expansion of PV capacity and beneficial climatic conditions for wind
generation were the primary factors encouraging a higher share of
generation from renewables. “Nevertheless, the energy transition is
entering the 2020s with a heavy burden,” says Dr. Patrick Graichen,
Director of Agora Energiewende.
“The expansion of wind energy has collapsed by more than 80% over the
last two years and has thus nearly ground to a halt. Furthermore, as
bids from industry to construct wind farms did not fully exploit the
capacity budget in 2019, we will not see robust expansion figures for
wind energy in the coming years either. It is now up to the federal
government to make policy adjustments so that wind power capacity
continues to expand. Wind is the workhorse of the energy transition, and
without wind power, we cannot succeed in phasing out coal or meeting our
climate protection targets.”
The annual review also shows that the cost of supporting renewable
energy will soon fall. In 2019, Germany and Luxembourg were the European
countries with the lowest wholesale electricity prices. Furthermore,
upward and downward price fluctuations on the wholesale market
(including negative electricity prices) were less frequent in 2019, and
there were no supply shortages. “This is a sign that security of supply
in Germany was consistently high last year,” says Graichen.
Total demand in 2019 fell to 569TWh, the lowest level registered in the
past 20 years – even lower than that of 2009, during the economic
crisis. Lower demand is being driven by slower economic growth, lower
consumption by the energy-intensive basic materials industry, and lower
on-site consumption by conventional power plants, which are being
increasingly supplanted by renewable energy systems.
As in 2019, the experts expect a 1GW increase in onshore wind energy and
a 4GW increase in solar. Offshore wind capacity is growing faster thanks
to the commissioning of new wind farms in the second half of 2019 and
the first half of 2020. The 2020 trends that will be seen for lignite,
hard coal and natural gas – thus for carbon emissions – remain
uncertain, as they depend crucially on coal, gas and CO2 prices, as well
as on wind conditions.
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