Clever people, those Germans.
Figures just published appeared to vindicate Germany’s clean energy revolution, showing that the country’s electricity surplus had nearly quadrupled between 2011 and 2012.
However, the figures do not take into account the cost of subsidising renewable energy, which some estimates put at €14bn (£11.8bn).
Domestic energy consumers in Germany pay a surcharge on their electricity bills to fund government incentives for green energy. The costs for householders are higher because big businesses are exempted from the charges after complaints that making firms pay would hurt Germany’s global competitiveness.
Here in America, or course, we subsidize fossil fuels the old fashioned way, with multi trillion dollar wars for oil, massive tax breaks, public land giveaways, and, of course, with the lungs, brains, and circulatory health of our children.
Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government shut down the country’s eight oldest nuclear reactors after the Fukushima nuclear disaster in March 2011. The remaining nine are due to be phased out by 2022, and the government has set a target of getting 80pc of electricity from renewables by 2050. The move was a dramatic shift in energy policy, pinning the future of Europe’s biggest economy entirely on green energy.
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