Data from a utility group in Germany, BDEW and the Centre for Solar Energy and Hydrogen Research (ZSW) showed on Friday that renewable energy accounted for 50.3% of Germany’s power consumption in the first three months of the year.
Germany has an extant target to get green power from solar, wind, biomass and hydroelectric generation that would account for 80% of its energy mix by 2030, after it abandons nuclear power and aims to cut most of its coal generation, using gas plants mostly for grid back-up.
BDEW noted in a statement that preliminary figures partly reflected lower power consumption in the first three months of 2023 when electricity usage fell 6.4% year-on-year to 138.1 terawatt hours (TWh).
Renewables accounted for 49.2% of the mix in the first three months of 2022.
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The group said the data was calculated under European Union requirements that base the share on usage rather than production, a method also adopted by the Berlin government for its climate target definitions.
“Because the renewable share is measured by its share in overall usage, lower (electricity) consumption means a higher relative share and vice versa,” it added.
The two research bodies recorded a fall of 8.3% to 147.5 TWh in the three-month period, including production volumes directed for export by looking at domestic electricity production.
Within the output total, renewables, at 69.5 TWh, accounted for a share of 47.1%, up from 45.1% in the first three months of 2022, even as green power production volumes dropped 4.3%.
Conventional energy sources – nuclear, coal, natural gas and oil – provided 78 TWh within the generation total, down from 88.3 TWh a year earlier.
Story was adapted from Reuters.
