German energy industry

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Germany's coal balance (since 1980)
Germany's natural gas balance (since 1970)

The German energy industry has many parallels to the energy industry in other European countries.

In the 21st century, many industrialized nations are undergoing an energy turnaround towards the use of sustainable energy sources, with Germany playing a pioneering role.

history

In Germany, a state-controlled structure of regional monopolies developed with defined and state-guaranteed demarcation lines at the national level on the one hand and at the level of the municipal energy supply companies (EVU, municipal utilities ) on the other. The Energy Industry Act (EnWG), initiated by the National Socialists in 1935 in preparation for the war economy, played a central role here. The municipalities are responsible for securing the energy supply within the framework of municipal services of general interest , which in the Federal Republic of Germany received constitutional status with the Basic Law .

While in the German Democratic Republic (GDR) the level of municipal supply structures was adapted to the centralized planning of the state-wide energy supply, the Federal Republic retained the horizontally split structure and essentially also the Energy Industry Act (EnWG) of 1935. With the accession of the GDR to the Federal Republic of Germany, the municipal supply structure in the newly created federal states was restored .

In the 1970s and 1980s there were bitter disputes over the use of nuclear energy in Germany . The Greens had one of their strongest roots in the anti-nuclear movement . The red-green federal government (1998-2005) under Chancellor Gerhard Schröder agreed to phase out nuclear power during energy consensus talks with German nuclear power plant operators .

With the amendment of the EnWG in 1998, the path of gradual liberalization of the energy industry began. It was made necessary by a corresponding directive of the European Union from 1996. On July 13, 2005, another amendment ( Second Law on the New Regulation of Energy Industry Law ) came into force.

In 2005, Germany recorded an export surplus of 8.5 billion kWh in the overall balance between electricity export and import. In 2007 the surplus was 19.1 billion kWh and in 2009 14.3 billion kWh. In 2012 the export surplus was 23 billion kWh.

2007 the decided Federal Network Agency , the business processes to supply customers with electricity . This regulates all processes between the market players involved (distribution network operator, old and new supplier) that are associated with the change of supplier of an electricity customer and that are necessary for the proper handling of supplies to the customer. The reason for the regulation was a previously inadequate application of the processes independently developed by the market players involved to implement the requirements from the EnWG, as these were not legally binding. This was established by the official regulation.

The next regulation of the electricity market by the Federal Network Agency followed in 2009 . The market rules adopted on June 10, 2009 for the implementation of balancing group accounting for electricity , MaBiS for short, regulate the balancing of the amounts of energy distributed in the electricity network in one month and the accounting of the balancing groups. Here, too, a major reason was that the regulations developed in the market were only inadequately applied due to the lack of legally binding force. Result were z. Sometimes considerable disadvantages and, above all, financial risks, especially for energy suppliers. The MaBiS came into force in full on June 1, 2010.

In the course of the energy transition since 2000, the economic importance of renewable energies has increased sharply, which meanwhile represent a significant economic factor for German industry. In addition, the power grid will change as a result of the grid expansion .

To date (2014) Germany produces more lignite than any other country.

Power generation

A large part of electricity in Germany (36% in 2018) is still generated with coal. However, the share of renewable energies has been increasing for several years, mainly due to the expansion of wind power .

Gross electricity generation in Germany in%
Energy source 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011
Renewable energy 35 33 29 30th 26th 24 22nd 20th
of which wind power 18th 16 12 14th 9 9 7th 8th
of which photovoltaics 7th 6th 6th 6th 6th 5 5 3
of which biomass 7th 7th 7th 7th 7th 7th 6th 5
of which hydropower 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
including household waste 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
Brown coal 23 23 23 24 25th 26th 26th 25th
Hard coal 13 14th 17th 18th 18th 19th 19th 19th
natural gas 13 13 12 9 10 11 11 14th
Nuclear energy 12 12 13 14th 16 15th 16 18th
Others 5 5 5 5 5 5 6th 5
Gross total production 649 TWh 654 TWh 648 TWh 652 TWh 614 TWh 631 TWh 618 TWh 615 TWh

Associations

There are numerous energy industry associations in Germany, the following is a selection:

The Federal Association of Energy and Water Management was created in 2007 from the merger of the Federal Association of the German Gas and Water Management (BGW) , the Association of the Electricity Industry (VDEW) , the Association of Network Operators (VDN) and the Association of Network Companies and Regional Energy Suppliers in Germany (VRE) .

literature

  • Wilm Tegethoff : The law of the public energy supply , ETV since 1982 (first edition), together with Ulrich Büdenbender, Heinz Klinger
  • Wilm Tegethoff: Problems of spatial energy supply , Vincentz Hannover 1986, ISBN 3-87870-765-7 .
  • Thomas Schöne : Contract manual electricity industry. Practical design and legally secure application , Vwew Energieverlag 2007, ISBN 978-3-8022-0865-2 .
  • Held, Theobald: Municipal Economy in the 21st Century , Vwew Energieverlag 2007, ISBN 3-8022-0780-7 .
  • Bontrup, Heinz-J. / Marquardt, Ralf-M .: Critical Handbook of the German Electricity Industry. Industry development - corporate strategies - industrial relations , edition sigma, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-8360-8712-4 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Federal Association of Energy and Water Management ( Memento of the original from March 19, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed March 15, 2011 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.bdew.de
  2. ↑ www.ag-energiebilanzen.de 'Gross electricity generation in Germany from 1990–2015 by energy source' , accessed on May 29, 2016
  3. ^ Agency for Renewable Energies: Renewable Energies - A win for Germany as a business location. Berlin 2014
  4. ↑ Janosch Delcker, Martin Sümening, Christoph Seidler: Risky cheap energy. spiegel.de, June 24, 2014, accessed October 1, 2014
  5. ^ Federal Statistical Office Destatis (Ed.): Statistisches Jahrbuch . 2019, ISBN 978-3-8246-1086-0 , pp. 715 .
  6. ^ Federal Statistical Office Destatis (Ed.): Statistisches Jahrbuch . 2018, ISBN 978-3-8246-1074-7 , pp. 711 .
  7. ^ Federal Statistical Office Destatis (Ed.): Statistisches Jahrbuch . 2017, ISBN 978-3-8246-1057-0 , pp. 707 .
  8. ^ Federal Statistical Office, Wiesbaden (ed.): Statistisches Jahrbuch . 2016, ISBN 978-3-8246-1049-5 , pp. 696 .
  9. ^ Federal Statistical Office, Wiesbaden (ed.): Statistisches Jahrbuch . 2015, ISBN 978-3-8246-1037-2 , pp. 693 .
  10. ^ Federal Statistical Office, Wiesbaden (ed.): Statistisches Jahrbuch . 2014, ISBN 978-3-8246-1029-7 , pp. 693 .
  11. ^ Federal Statistical Office, Wiesbaden (ed.): Statistisches Jahrbuch . 2013, ISBN 978-3-8246-1007-5 , pp. 689 .
  12. ^ Federal Statistical Office, Wiesbaden (ed.): Statistisches Jahrbuch . 2012, ISBN 978-3-8246-0990-1 , pp. 687 .