Solar energy hit a record in Germany over the weekend, supplying almost 50% of its midday electricity on Friday and Saturday, reports Reuters.
The 22 gigawatts (GW) of solar energy per hour – a world record – is the equivalent produced by 20 nuclear plants.
"Never before anywhere has a country produced as much photovoltaic electricity," Norbort Allnoch, Director of the Institute of the Renewable Energy Industry, told Reuters. "Germany came close to the 20 GW mark a few times in recent weeks. But this was the first time we made it over."
A year ago, solar supplied 14 GW per hour. Last year, a record-breaking 7.5 GW was installed and this year, 1.8 GW has been added in just the first quarter. Germany now has 26 GW of solar capacity.
Germany consistently gets 4% of its electricity from solar and about 20% from renewable energy. Its solar capacity is almost the amount of all the world combined. The country is on track to meet its greenhouse gas reduction target of 35% below 1990 levels by 2020.
To do that, the country is spending $263 billion – about 8% of GDP in 2011 – to transform its energy sources, upgrade and add some 2800 miles of transmission lines, and modernize power stations to integrate fluctuating supplies of solar and wind.
"The energy transformation is the biggest modernization and infrastructure project in the coming decade. Whether other countries follow our model will depend on whether we succeed," said Philipp Roesler, Germany’s Economy Minister in a televised speech.
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“To do that, the country is spending $263 billion – about 8% of GDP in 2011”
Do you mean 2012?
No wonder Greece is trying to get into solar in a significant way. And isn’t the expenditure of a barrel of oil added to the GDP? Why shouldn’t the use of the energy of Solar increase the figure of GDP?
Warren, Germany will spend $263 billion going forward, which is the equivalent of about 8% GDP in 2011.
“50% midday electricity” ? What is the big deal here ? What about the rest of the day (daylight ) ? This news is easy to misunderstood and maybe this is exactly what they want. On other source they didn’t mention they miday production but they as far as saying that solar in Germany produced 50% of the peak demand on last Saturday . C
Luca, it may not sound like a big deal, but it’s a breakthrough for solar to produce that much energy.
Anybody inviting Angela to lunch to pump her for insider info on her plans to cancel the geoengineering chemtrail experiments over German skies?