Germany considers ramping up coal power to avert energy crisis

There's also the fact that Germany closed down nuclear plants. Which I think shouldn't have been a priority even in comparison with gas plants.

Coal can't price compete, so you should really care. It's obviously the next viable fossil fuel energy source for power generation over natural gas considering most places existing infrastructure. We aren't talking about what can be done with 10-20 more years of solar and grid installs, we are talking about what can be done in the next 12-18 months. So.. yeah.. nice you want to help, but sometimes helping without knowing what you're talking about isn't actually helping. Coal and gas will get phased out by solar and grid batteries ever falling costs, but it's not magic, batteries and grid infrastructure takes a couple decades to build up to that level no matter how hard you try and we really did have to wait for grid batteries to get at least this good.. and ideally still quite a bit better. EVs will catch on, but a car is a big purchase price and the used market and charging options do have to grow. That too takes decades more or less no matter what we do, rushing it just makes everything cost more and ensures more screw ups. The tech is moving about as fast as it can as most progress is and has been bottlenecked by battery technology for decades. If you have some awesome battery innovation to speed things up... please stop holding back, otherwise unhelpful logic is not helpful.

Well yeah, what if they got hit by a 9.0 earthquake and subsequent 40m tsunami like Japan? Such disasters are commonplace in Germany. The risk was too great. /s

Stupidest decision they have made in modern times. Well, until now: lets ramp up coal a known pollution source, but lets end nuclear which isn't anywhere as environmentally damaging, but lets keep that anti nuclear fear mongering going for no f****** good reason.

Why do Christians care so little about the planet god gave them?

Were you on that path? Whenever I look at the daily CO2 per capita for electricity generation, Germany is almost always producing 10X more than France.  The intermittency of wind/solar means your system needs deployable power, which in reality means it forces Germany to remain dependent on fossil fuels a substantial portion of the day, while France produces very little CO2 for its nuclear based electrical grid

Nah, because it wasn’t considered safe enough after Fukushima and the German states are not willing to store the waste. Bavaria does everything to fight looking for suitable places to store it while demanding to get it back. What should be criticized is Germany lacking in renewables. In the early 2000s we were the world‘s leading developer & manufacturer of solar energy, then the conservatives cut all funding and we willingly gave that industry to China while now crying about being dependent on China. Absolutely laughable.

Well done, Merkel.

Nuclear cannot survive without implicit government subsidies. No insurance company is willing to take on that risk for a price the nuclear plants can afford.

It really has nothing to do with nuclear, but all with the lack of a greater expansion of renewables. Don't get how people make the nuclear connection to anything, but in reality, it's just bs. Stop spreading nonsense like this.

Kind of a weird opportunity to bring up nuclear because you can’t spontaneously increase their output during an energy crisis. So unless you are near 100% nuclear, increased gas/oil prices would always be compensated by coal in Germany.

Coal power plants should be so much simpler to use and switch on/off on demand, so not like they don't have any advantage over nuclear. If there would be massive volcanic eruption and half of the sky would be covered in "volcanic smoke" you still would rather just "invest more in solar" rather than use what needs to be used now?

Don't fall for Politico's lobby money infused nothingburger populism bullshit! They are very carefully tiptoeing around claims they could actually have to call names and show proof for ... or get fined. As of [the 2024 government report](https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/presse/pressemitteilungen/klimaziele-bis-2030-erreichbar), Germany was even ahead of reaching the 2030 goal of cutting greenhouse emissions of 1990 by 63% , although some parameters are casting doubts now. If we look at Ukraine, Iran, Trump, and the rise of right wingnut parties in Europe and Germany, importing enough oil and gas seems to get more expensive every day. The call for burning more coal is an expected knee jerk reflex of the lobbies and the Russian directed troll armies.

Crises have effects, believe it or not 

Hey you, are you aware we live in 2026 and also 50% by 2030 is still 50%. Yes, less dependant not Independent. But sure we can all live in dreams and hopes