Netherlands could have run 6 days on discarded green power in second quarter - Energy Central
Netherlands could have run 6 days on discarded green power in second quarter | Energy Central
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Netherlands could have run 6 days on discarded green power in second quarter
- Jul 3, 2024 12:46 am GMT
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Copyright © ChangeInc 2023
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These are the monthly figures from Energieopwek.nl, a collaboration of the National Climate Platform with EnTranCe/Hanzehogeschool Groningen, Tennet and Gasunie.
Most solar energy
Last June, renewable energy production grew by 9 percent compared to last year. This was mainly because there have been more wind turbines since then. On land these generated 15 percent more energy, at sea even 35 percent. Of all the energy consumed, 20 percent was electricity. In total, almost two-thirds (64 percent) of all Dutch electricity generated in June was green. Last year the figure was 56 percent. Solar panels had the largest share in this: 38.1 percent. That's the same as last year, but that was because it was less sunny last month than during the 2023 heat wave.
Surpluses increase
As the capacity of wind and solar power continues to increase, there are increasing surpluses of green power. Especially on sunny and windy days on weekends, when demand is low. The surpluses will only increase in the coming years, if only because dozens of gigawatts of new offshore wind farms are being added. Because of overloads and capacity shortages on the electricity grid (grid congestion) and because of less demand, this power cannot always be delivered to businesses and other customers. Exporting abroad, which we often do now, is becoming less easy because other European countries are also generating more green power themselves.
More often negative power prices
At times like that, the electricity price is negative. This year that was already the case for 286 hours. By comparison, in all of 2023, the power price was negative for 372 hours. Producers then turn off their panels or shut down their turbines because they can't make money from it or the grid can't handle their supplied power. So as long as that green power cannot be stored in batteries or hydrogen, it is not "harvested" and thrown away.
Six days of power thrown away
Energy Generation calculated that in the past three months, every time prices were negative, 6 gigawatts of wind turbines and solar panels were turned off. That means 1,700 gigawatt hours of green power was thrown away in those months. By comparison,
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