On May 11, 2014, Electricity in Germany Was Free...Thanks to Renewable Energy

For a short period of time, an hour or so, on May 11, the price of electricity in Germany was €0.0. Free. A windy, sunny day on the continent. Germany, trying to free herself from nuclear power after Fukushima, and reducing greenhouse gasses, gets 27% of her energy from renewables. And Germany achieved that in one decade.

Back in 1999 Germany needed electricity. But after Chenobyl, there was no way that Germany would build new nuclear power plants. Germany has no oil reserves. Natural gas is expensive in Europe. No way Germany would buy from Russia. So they started the 100,000 roofs program. Banks, which are strong in Germany, in the sense of having large cash reserves, were required to provide 10-year, low interest loans to the German people to install solar panels on their houses. Germany also passed the Renewable Energy Law, which required that the power companies pay the homeowners above-market rates for the electricity generated by their solar panels to match the cost of the panels, i.e. to pay for the loans. Why should the power company pay a higher rate? Because that higher-rate more accurately reflects the true cost of the electricity generated from non-renewable energy sources after factoring in the costs of building the new power plants, cleaning up the ash and mercury wastes from burning coal, the costs of transportation of the fossils fuels, etc. etc. The costs of so-called "externalities", costs that get pushed on to society and aren't born by the source of those costs.

So the German homeowner gets free solar panels, the country gets renewable energy sources. How well has it worked? By 2007, Germany was producing half the worlds solar energy. In 2007, Germany gained 1300 megawatts of capacity. In 2008, 2000 megawatts. In 2009, Germany added 2500 megawatts. In comparison, the last 5 nuclear powerplants the US built (all back in the 1970's) added 5800 megawatts. So Germany added the equivalent in three years. Between 1999 and 2011, Germany added 24800 megawatts of capacity. And while there are problems running a national grid on renewables (the sun doesn't shine every day, nor does the wind blow all the time), people like Elon Musk (think Tesla motors) are banking on batteries and electric cars as the way to go in the future.

Of course, America could have done that. But that would have been "socialistic". Can you imagine the US Congress mandating American banks to loan money to homeowners to buy solar? We don't do things that way. Or maybe only once, after a Great Depression, when we have a strong leader. FDR, where are you?