German power sector varies energy sources

Integrated traditional and alternative energy is the way to build power plants in Germany to secure the country’s electricity capacity for sustainable growth.

According to the Fraunhofer Society, Germany’s installed electricity-generating capacity is 107 per cent of peak demand. Demand peaked at 84.49 gigawatts on July 16, while installed capacity is 175.02GW.

Almost half of capacity, or 85.23GW, is from alternative energy including wind, solar, biomass and hydropower, and the rest from traditional energy such as coal, gas and nuclear.

“Germany’s government announced it would suspend the use of nuclear power in 2022. That means the country has to find other energy sources, both alternative and traditional, especially coal,” Ratanachai Namwong, deputy governor for power plant development at the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand, said after a visit to a coal power plant in Germany early this month.

Germany is one of the countries that use coal to produce electricity because this is a way to secure the country’s electricity production when alternative energy sources such as wind and solar are unstable because of the changing seasons.

“We admit that coal-fired electricity plants make pollution, but we have to develop our technology to reduce pollution so that they can be clean plants,” Michael Fuengeling, spokesman for the Niederaussem lignite-fired power plant, said at a presentation on the strategy to develop such plants in the country.

The company has to research and develop a way to reduce emissions of both sulphur dioxide and carbon dioxide from the production process.

On average, lignite-fired power plants emit 500 kilograms of carbon dioxide per kilowatt-hour.

The company now is studying ways to reduce this at its small 150-megawatt power plant. It could reduce emissions from 500kg/kW-h to 300kg/kW-h by spending about 150 million euros (Bt6 billion) on the plant.

The ways to reduce emissions include using carbon dioxide from the production process to raise algae, and scrubbing, which is an ultramodern climate-protection system for coal-fired power plants.

The main objective of the study is the long-term energy, ecological and economic balance of the entire algae-production process and subsequent conversion and usage options.

However, this study will take time.

 

Communication and education

Coal-fired power plants still pollute the environment. The company has to communicate with the community surrounding the coal power plant about its measures to produce less environmental pollution.

“We reduced sulphur-dioxide and carbon-dioxide emissions to below the standard. This is safe for the community,” Fuengeling said.

The company has to explain to the community its safety system and also has to recruit staff from the community to work at the plant. They will communicate back to the community what the plant’s systems do for the community’s safety.

The company also provides education to the community on what the plant does to reduce emissions. Because of that, its lignite-fired power plant has been able to co-exist with the community since its establishment.

Germany has to build new power plants to replace the nuclear plants that had total capacity of 12.07GW, by combining both traditional and alternative energy. 

Coal-fired plants are one of its traditional-source choices, while solar, wind, biomass and hydropower plants are also being invested in to meet demand for electricity, which is growing in step with the economy. 

The country has enough coal reserves to support these power plants, while their operators are also doing research and developing their technology to reduce sulphur-dioxide and carbon-dioxide emissions. 

“If our pilot project to reduce carbon dioxide is a success and can be developed to be used with the largest coal-fired power plant, it can be expanded to coal-fired plants nationwide,” Fuengeling said.

A coal-fired power plant has lower costs than alternative-energy plants. That helps people save money on their electric bill. 

Households in Germany pay 0.292 euro (about Bt13) per kilowatt-hour, while industrial consumers pay 0.143 euro.