Renewable energy covered 35% of Germany’s electricity consumption in the first half of 2017, up two percentage points on last year, new figures show.
Offshore wind generation increased by 47.5% to 8.8bn kilowatt-hours (kWh) in the first six months of the year, compared with 5.9bn kWh in the same period of 2016, according to the Centre for Solar Energy and Hydrogen Research in Baden-Württemberg (ZSW) and the German Association of Energy and Water Industries (BDEW).
Onshore wind supplied 39.4bn kWh in the period, up 13.6% from 34.7bn kWh last year, while solar grew 13.5% to 21.9bn kWh from 19.3bn kWh.
Biomass contributed 23.2bn kWh of electricity, an increase of 2.2% on the 22.7bn kWh generated last year.
Municipal solid waste saw a 5% rise, but hydro dropped 18% and geothermal 7%.
BDEW chairman Stefan Kapferer said the increase in renewable energy’s contribution was “gratifying”.
However, he warned that “unfortunately, the necessary grid expansion is not keeping pace with the growth in regenerative plants because of all the time lost to political debates”.
Kapferer said grid and renewables expansion have to be “far more closely linked and better meshed to reduce the enormous costs of stabilizing networks”.
Image: EWE
