“Electricity supply transition” is a better description of what’s actually happened. We have a growing supply of renewably generated electricity that is impressive, but otherwise nothing much. The Energiewende had gotten off to a good start, but now it’s faltering and in danger of being stopped entirely. Take, for example, investment into a new and better grid or advances in storage capacity, where little has happened. The demand side is completely ignored, namely energy efficiency in industry, mobility, and buildings. The boom in renewables is a success but with caveats. Now we need new gas-fired plants that are efficient and low-carbon to back them up, but the problem is that they’re just not lucrative at the moment. The gas price in Germany is too high and the price of carbon is too low. So what we see now is investment into coal-fired power plants and this is not compatible with a stable energy transition. If we continue this way and do not, for example, correct the price of CO2 we will effectively be substituting coal for nuclear power. This is harmful to the climate and undermines the effort to reduce GHG emissions, where Germany is clearly failing.
