The importance of Renewable Energy to Germany just got profounder

Germany’s a country that can never stop exploring or stop bettering itself. Peter Watson, in his informing appraisal account of the German character, has said, “The Germans dive deeper and emerge muddier.”

The tenacity of the country to explore its possibilities and offer something symbolic and powerful to the world has often caught the imagination of the people.

While for the better part of the world, it will always be renowned for engineering, manufacturing, and its technical prowess, the Germans have also contributed massively in shaping thought and imagination. Had there been no Kant, Schopenhauer, or Nietzche, there’d have been a ghastly void in the spirit of self-inquiry and that pertaining to the world around us.

Germany moved on from its tectonic past to being deliberately embroiled but in meaningful, constructive, nation-building endeavors ever since the Second World War ended.

Later, upon the unification of the Wall, in Berlin, amid times that were albeit mired by inner strife but drawn by much of what was happening in the rest of the world, one could say, Germany began interacting with the world- under Helmut Kohl, its great unifier- in a more sustained way.

But that said, as a nation devoted for upholding the ideals and principles of a developed 21st century nation, one that thinks about financial muscle or economic robustness as much as it thinks about working alongside the EU to redevelop Europe (and playing its own unique part in it), Germany doesn’t like to mire in the past; it much prefers to stay in the present.

Now that said, in the sphere of education, innovation, manufacturing, exports, and other spheres, there’s nothing that Germany has not done to deserve the attention it often gets.

For a country that is the home to some of the best and most admired automotive players in the world, Germany is also conscientious about a cleaner, greener future.

And speaking on the lines of the energy industry, one that holds immense value and purpose for the German GDP, it appears that there’s interesting shape-shifting news of sports for Deutschland.

So what really is the matter and what is making news concerning the energy industry in Germany?

Well, the interesting news is that, for the first time ever, the share or contribution of Renewables vis-a-vis coal in producing or generating electricity in Germany has increased. Not even in the past two-to-three decades did the share of Renewable energy increase to an extent that it would sideline coal.

But well, things happen for the first time, often, now don’t they? There are countries that care about Climate Change. There are countries that are still to do their share. Then there’s Germany, that decided nearly a decade ago that no amount of electricity whatsoever would be derived from nuclear power.

At present, the following are the biggest contributors toward electricity generation in Germany:

Wind

Solar

Hydro

Biomass

Together, the four are collectively responsible for producing around 40 per cent of the total electricity production in Germany. The revered Fraunhofer Institute is of the view that over the course of the past few years, there has been a 20 per cent increase in the solar capacity has furthered the push of the green sources in the country.

But here’s a perspective.

Along with the much-needed push in solar, the other things that have worked out well for Angela Merkel’s country happen to be:

a) Shuttering of old power plants

b) A huge surge in solar power installations

c) Coal-plant closures.

The third step, arguably, could be said to have given the country the right push it so needed toward working toward a less coal-reliant future.

And that’s not too bad a start is it Gemany?