GM Like Most Every Other Major OEM in Germany Is Going Solar in a Big Way

[xcel]

8.15 MW from one of largest solar arrays in Europe!

Wayne Gerdes - CleanMPG - Aug 18, 2012

GMs Rüsselsheim Solar install for as far as the eye can see… Almost

GM is adding to its portfolio of solar generated electricity with the addition of an 8.15-megawatt solar array on the rooftop of the Opel Rüsselsheim facility in Germany. The arrays size is an incredible 32 soccer fields or area large!

According to GM, the array will generate approximately 7.3 million kW hours from sunlight. With it, GM is well on its way to meeting a self imposed target of 125 MW by 2020.

Combined with the other European installations, GM will be capable of producing 19.1 million kWh, the same amount of carbon sequestered annually by 1,586 acres of pine forests according to the company.

The solar electricity produced at Rüsselsheim feeds directly into the grid of the plant and is used in vehicle production. Excess solar power is fed into the public grid of Stadtwerke Mainz, a leading energy provider in Germany.

GM’s Rüsselsheim array is a significant renewable energy complement to two of the top five largest rooftop solar arrays in the world with the world’s largest on top of GM’s Zaragoza Spain and Kaiserslautern Germany manufacturing sites. The amount of electricity generated by the trio is equivalent to the amount needed to supply 5,800 households with their annual electricity needs.

That is a lot of solar generated electrical power!

Does anyone know what kind of incentives there are in Germany for these kinds of massive installs? With the Euro down, imported panels are probably pretty expensive and I do not see GM pushing solar here in the US where it is probably more cost effective to install plus more actual sunlight hours although not as cost effective from an electricity grid purchase cost basis.

[Right Lane Cruiser]

We need as much of this sort of thing as we can possibly get. I just wish I could put an array on my own roof!

[herm]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/...-a-837007.html

About 200,000 recipients of Hartz IV, Germany's benefits program for the long-term unemployed, had their power cut off last year because of unpaid bills, according to Paritätische Gesamtverband, an umbrella association for social movements in Germany.

The consumer protection organization for the federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia estimates that number to be as high as 600,000 per year. Ulrike Mascher, president of VdK, an interest group focusing on social justice, uses terms such as "fuel poverty" and a "blatant violation of fundamental social rights," when talking about the issue.

Meanwhile, the next price hikes are just around the corner. "The cost of electricity will rise, there's no question about that," says Jochen Homann, head of Germany's state-run Federal Network Agency.

The federal Economy Ministry calculates internally that prices will increase by between three and five euro cents per kilowatt hour within the next 12 months, in order to finance renewable energy subsidies and grid expansion. Those increases amount to an additional annual burden of between €105 and €175 ($130 and $220) for a family of three.

Consumer protection advocates and interest groups focusing on social issues blame the federal government for these increases. In particular, they say, the unchecked expansion of highly-subsidized photovoltaic installations is driving prices up, without the benefit of creating a commensurate increase in supply.

[herm]

http://www.boston.com/business/artic...ricity_prices/

German Economy Minister Philip Roesler said Tuesday that the country needs to do more to ensure the steady and reasonably priced availability of electricity as the country phases out nuclear power over the next decade.

The debate on the country's energy switchover currently "lacks honesty" as electricity prices will be rising amid high subsidies for the renewable energies that are set to replace nuclear power by 2022, he said.

Energy prices cannot be predicted exactly -- especially as a massive amount of investment is needed to upgrade the electricity grid and power generation -- "but it won't be cheaper," Roesler said. Subsidies must be curbed to keep costs in check and safeguard the industry's competitiveness, he said.

Germany permanently switched off the eight oldest of its 17 nuclear reactors last year, just after Japan's Fukushima disaster. The successful transformation or the country's energy sector "will decide on Germany's image as a leading industrial power," added Environment Minister Peter Altmaier.

Both ministers, speaking at a conference taking stock of the country's progress a year after Parliament voted to speed up pulling the plug on nuclear power, were confident that the mammoth transformation of the country's energy sector will go ahead successfully.

"On a sunny day, when the wind blows nicely, we will soon be capable of securing our supply through renewable energies alone," Altmaier said.

The installation of new solar and wind production capacity will reach a new high this year, he said, noting that solar panels across Germany recently produced a "world record" amount of power that was equal to the output of 20 nuclear power plants, or about half the country's required electricity at that point.

"But there are also cold days," he added, acknowledging that the most difficult part of the government's energy switchover is to ensure Germany will always have enough and affordable energy from fossil-fuel plants to fill the gap when needed.

Wind, solar and other renewable energy sources currently account for some 20 percent of Germany's electricity production and are set to produce a third of it within a decade, reaching 80 percent by 2050.

The government has yet to find a strategy of how to keep fossil-fuel plants online as a backup. These older power stations have been stripped of their profitability because the priority given to renewable energy. Several energy companies are also threatening to close some of them.

Roesler maintained the answer cannot be further subsidies to utilities that will drive up electricity prices further. This would affect low income families who would then in turn require a new subsidy as they can no longer afford their power bills.

Subsidies and investment incentives for renewable energies are mostly financed through a special tax on electricity prices paid for by all households that has been rising over the past years -- adding up to roughly (EURO)157 ($195) per year for a typical family of four.

[herm]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/...85J0VP20120620

A steep decline in German electricity prices suggests firms are preparing for harder economic times ahead, reinforcing the grim outlook seen in leading indicators of economic sentiment published this week.

Germany has so far weathered the sovereign debt crisis that has gripped much of Europe during the past year, but German wholesale electricity forward prices have dropped more than 20 percent since April, Reuters data shows.

Prices for delivery in 2013 are now back at levels from 2009, the height of the financial crisis, reflecting lower expectations by the German manufacturing sector. The prices depend strongly on demand from the German manufacturing sector.

Falling electricity prices could now be partly due to an increase in renewable energy supply expected to come to the grid next year.

[herm]

Feed-In-Tariff pays the renewable energy producer $0.25 per kWh produced, consumers pay $0.35 per kWh of electricity consumed.

http://www.realclearenergy.org/chart...es_106641.html

"Feed-in tariffs" is a fancy name for price supports - the kind that have produced agricultural surpluses and large wealth transfers to farmers in the US for almost a century. Europe got into feed-in tariffs early. As far back as 1990, Germany enacted a feed-in tariff that guaranteed providers of solar electricity a price well above market level. Consequently, it has been very easy for solar producers to make a profit. The idea was to foster domestic industries but much of transfer has ended up going to Chinese firms.

The less obvious downside, however, is that consumers end up paying more for electricity. The high solar prices are averaged in with all other sources and consumers end up paying the bill, both as taxpayers and consumers.

Although IER does not say it outright, the suggestion that the Germans pay high electrical prices because of the feed-in tariff. They support this by noting that the only country that pays more for electricity is Denmark, which has splurged even more on feed-in tariffs for wind. Several comments on the IER website, however, argue that solar's contribution is too small to have such an impact. Germany did report that that it is got 26 percent of its electricity from renewables in the first quarter and solar was 21 percent of that, making it 5 percent of all electricity.

IER argues that the German solar industry is about to suffer now that Germany has found it too expensive to maintain the feed-in tariffs. They say Spain has had a worse experience, with $50 billion in wind and solar-related debt now floating around the country. Spain's solar bubble, which soon popped, has played a large role in its overall debt crisis as well.

[Right Lane Cruiser]

It seems to me that avoiding nuclear power is a mistake.

[worthywads]

I was in Deutschland near Munchen for 5 days in the spring and I didn't see the sun once.

A week long visit a few years back in september was almost as overcast.

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

The FITs are gradually being reduced. It's already been cut between 15 and 12% depending on system size. The rate of decrease depends on the amount installed capacity.

[herm]

California might be worse (not sure if this is still true).. over there if you have a big house consuming a high amount of energy you are in a high tier and pay more for electricity.. but if you have solar panels the utility will FIT you using the high rates.. so if you have solar panels it pays to be an energy hog. Your neighbor subsidized your solar installation.