The claim

Apparently gas consumption in Germany is currently increasing because a lot of electricity is exported to France, which is the actual reason for the rising gas prices and it is therefore important that more nuclear power plants have to be built.

Our conclusion

Due to the failed nuclear power plants, Germany is actually exporting more electricity to France - although not through gas combustion, which has actually declined, but through wind and solar power.

As if the reduced gas deliveries from Russia weren't bad enough, the current heat wave in Europe and maintenance work are now also causing 28 of the 56 nuclear power plants in France to for safety reasons and the output of several nuclear power plants to be reduced, so that there are currently only less than 30 gigawatts are produced instead of the other 61.4 gigawatts.
Apparently, this is why more gas is burned in Germany, which is then exported to France - at our expense, so to speak.
But that's not true!

The claims

There are all sorts of claims circulating about nuclear power plants, most of which are aimed at saying that nuclear power plants are much better than solar and wind systems, and the Green Party's politics are particularly popular. This sometimes leads to rather stupid sharepics like this one:

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Claim about nuclear power plant, source. Facebook

An article from ntv was used for the sharepic (see HERE ), the text “ What a stupid green babble. At night the French have 100% electricity thanks to nuclear power. “Germany has 0% electricity at night thanks to solar systems ” is of course not in the original picture.

In addition, the claim is nonsensical, since solar systems actually only produce electricity during the day, but the excess electricity is stored so that it can be used in the evening and at night, so you don't have to sit there with candlelight after dark.

The sharepic has also aged poorly because, as written above, the French are currently not getting enough electricity from their nuclear power plants, which is why electricity is exported from Germany to France - and that is why, according to our inquiries, the claim is circulating that this is why more natural gas is being burned in Germany becomes.

Is more gas being burned in Germany because of France?

UPDATE 08/18/2022

Current media reports (e.g. Markus Lanz from August 16, 2022) also speak of Germany producing more electricity from gas in order to deliver it to France. However, the figures we now have do not support these statements. Gas consumption for electricity generation in 2022 fluctuates monthly at or below the previous year's level.

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These figures from the Frauenhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems are publicly available energy-charts.info

Apparently we are currently more natural gas to replace the 16 faulty nuclear power plants in France that have been shut down on the grid.

The word “ just ”, the twin brother of “ now ”, is a problem child when it comes to statistical numbers. Because these numbers have the characteristic that they are late risers and always only show up at a party when it is already over. Therefore, without access to the raw data, these numbers would have to be estimated or extrapolated. The effort involved in obtaining up-to-date figures is high and is not always commensurate with the added value. So first let's take a look at the developments, which fortunately speak for themselves very clearly:

According to Statista (see HERE ), 33.6 terawatt hours were generated by burning natural gas in June 2022. This is around 20 terawatt hours less than in the same month last year . significantly less natural gas has been used so far in 2022 (as of July) than at the same time last year.

Calculated, that is around 60% less natural gas that was burned to generate electricity in June 2022 compared to June 2021 (i.e. before the French nuclear power plants went offline in October 2021).

In the first quarter of 2022, compared to the first quarter of 2021, significantly more electricity was generated from coal, wind power and photovoltaics, and significantly less electricity was generated from natural gas and nuclear energy. In contrast, electricity generation from natural gas fell by 17.0% compared to the same quarter of the previous year to a share of 13.0% of the amount of electricity fed in (1st quarter of 2021: 15.2%).

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Electricity feed-in from conventional and renewable energy sources, source: Destatis

Unfortunately, the Federal Statistical Office does not provide any absolute figures for the first quarter of 2022 (!), but it is also clear: less absolute electricity consumption and at the same time a lower proportion of electricity from burned natural gas mean: also absolutely less burned natural gas . If you look at the raw data in the database (available up to May 2022), gas consumption is roughly at the same level as the previous year or, in individual months, significantly lower.

What source does France's electricity come from?

According to Statista, in 2022 (as of early August), the amount of electricity exported from Germany to France reached a new high of around five terawatt hours. France generates a good 70 percent of its electricity by operating nuclear power plants, but since most of these are currently out of service, the amount exported to France has also risen sharply.

The amount of electricity exported abroad in the first quarter of 2022 was 13.8 terawatt hours , i.e. more than the remaining three German nuclear power plants produced in the same period (8.6 terawatt hours). And Germany can easily afford this export volume - thanks to wind and solar power .

Wind power generated 20.6 terawatt hours in February 2022 alone, and solar power generated 9.1 terawatt hours in the first quarter of 2022, even more than nuclear power plants in the same period.

Conclusion

Due to the failed nuclear power plants, Germany is actually exporting more electricity to France - although not through gas combustion, which has actually declined, but through wind and solar power. France itself is currently burning a lot more natural gas to make up for the deficits - which comes from Russia.

The constantly varying claims that Germany would be much better off with nuclear power plants and that France should be taken as a role model (as was said until a month ago) are proving to have aged very poorly: precisely because Germany is more focused on wind and energy If solar power is used, it is even possible to export electricity to France.

Research: Walter Feichtinger

Also interesting:

Environmental problem car tires.
Are we heading towards a huge waste disposal scandal? – This is how the tire mafia poisons nature


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