Lots of chatter surrounding a report from Germany calling for the end of their renewables surcharge policy; as usual the German Energy Blog informs on the nature of the report
While the government is in the process of revising the Renewable Energy Sources Act(EEG), the Commission of Experts on Research and Innovation (Expertenkommission Forschung und Innovation – EFI), recommends to abolish the EEG. Neither was it a cost-efficient climate protection tool, nor did it have a positive effect on innovation, the experts concluded in their 2014 report, presented to Chancellor Merkel today.
The EFI expert commission has been appointed by the federal government to provide scientific policy advice. A key objective of the commission is to point out strengths and weaknesses of the German innovation system and to develop proposals for national research and innovation policy. Its latest and very critical report contributes to the controversial EEG reform debate.
The increase of renewable energy sources in the gross electricity production from 7% in 2000, the year the EEG entered into force, to about 23% had resulted in high costs. EEG feed-in tariff payments rose from EUR 883 million in 2000 to EUR 23 billion in 2013...
...empirical studies for the period 1990 to 2005 could only find an impact of the fixed feed-in tariffs paid under the EEG on innovation for wind power plants. A new study that specifically examines the effects of EEG feed-in tariffs for the period 2000 to 2009 did not find a positive correlation in any renewable energy sector at all, the professors say.Read the entire article at the German Energy Blog:
...With feed-in tariffs that reflect average costs, an investor did not earn more by investing in a new technology than for an investment in an existing technology, while at the same time having a higher risk. Besides, market barriers for new technologies were likely to be created by the fast growth of old technologies that lead to cost reductions.
No comments:
Post a Comment