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Germany hits 62.7% renewables in 2024 energy mix, with solar contributing 14%
(www.pv-magazine.com)
this post was submitted on 03 Jan 2025
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Norway has one of the lowest. And they don't have only 62.7%.
99% of their energy comes from renewables.
And in the USA, some of the states with lowest prices have the highest % of renewables.
To be fair, Norway and those states rely heavily on hydro, which is great if you have the geography for it, but it's not a route that can work for every region.
Excluding hydro renewable sources tend to cost more if you include storage currently, though that premium has been and is coming down.
Iowa and South Dakota rely mostly on wind and are amongst the states that have the cheapest electricity in the USA - https://web.stanford.edu/group/efmh/jacobson/Articles/Others/24-08-Letter-Vance.pdf
List of countries and states and their % of renewables: https://web.stanford.edu/group/efmh/jacobson/WWSBook/Countries100Pct.pdf
It's certainly true it's easier when you have hydro though.
Exactly. I grew up in WA, USA, and power was always quite cheap due to how much comes from hydro. Now I'm in Utah, and it's only cheap because we use coal and natural gas (and produce a ton of the latter), though we're replacing a lot of that w/ solar (turns out deserts get lots of sun) and prices are remaining pretty low.
Renewable energy will certainly look different in each region. I don't know what would work best for Germany since I don't know the geography very well, but comparing Norway to Germany isn't going to be a productive conversation.
Norway regularly has very high energy prices.. in fact, they're so high they want to cut exports.
The reason they're high is because of the grid in other countries being hit by low wind or grey sky days, pushing up the minimum pricing that they're also subjected to by being part of the same grid.
https://www.ft.com/content/f0b621a1-54f2-49fc-acc1-a660e9131740
Seems to be a recent thing, as I was looking at data from Feb 2023, and unrelated to Norway's use of renewables.
Interesting article nonetheless.
They should definitely cone to a different pricing agreement with Norway as to not negatively affect them.
And it will be even less of a problem once those countries properly ramp up their installation of more renewables and storage.
Upgrading the grid infrastucture is a massive undertaking in some countries.
The UK grid is built around coal generation. With the shift to offshore wind away from population centres, new tranmission cables are required. Sadly there is excessive wind generation and suppliers are paid to shutdown. It is laughable.
But yes, with more renewables it will improve.