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Germany is the leader in solar energy. Their country is currently using the most out of all the other countries, but head of Germany's energy agency DENA, Stephan Kohler, says, "that using to much of the solar energy can cause blackouts." He also goes on to say that the demand for solar energy is low in the morning and high at night. These blackouts can be caused by simply having to much solar energy. The uptake of the solar energy has been so rapid that solar capacity could reach 30 gigawatts, by next year. This is equal to the entire countries weekend power consumption. Germany needs to stop putting up solar panels, this will hopefully help the blackout issue. Daniel Davies looked at the state of California and saw that when they use energy the most is in mid day. They turn on their air conditioners and use them, but in Europe air conditioners are very rare to have.
Reflection- I think that this is a very interesting thing, usually we hear about countries using to much energy, but in Germany's case they are not using enough energy. I never thought that too much solar energy could cause blackouts. It would be very bad if one day you went to go bake a cake and your oven wasn't working, or if you wanted to watch your favorite TV show and were not able to because there was no electricity in your house.
Questions-
1. What is the problem here?
2. Why is this a problem?
3. What is being done to try and help the problem
4. Do you think this is a good idea?
5. What would you do if this was your problem?
This really is strange, to hear of a country using too less energy. And with Germany only using much of its electricity at night, they are collecting more in the day. Also, how do they know that too much solar energy causes blackouts? Isn't it regularly good to have a lot of excess electricity? I hope Germany finds more/better ways to keep their energy from causing black outs.
ReplyDelete1. Germany is not using enough electricity, leading to black outs.
2. It could lead to black outs.
3. Stop putting solar panels up.
4. I think they should actually put some solar panels down where they are not needed.
5. I would try to find a way to store more electricity
This is an example of how effective solar energy can be in meeting energy demands without polluting, but it also shows that any type of change in the energy supply requires that people be patient until some of the kinks are worked out. I don't know that Americans would be as patient if they didn't have lights or heat because of too much solar energy.
ReplyDelete1.Black outs are occurring in Germany, because they are overloading the circuits with too much solar energy.
2.There are too many solar panels in Germany, so they are generating too much power and overloading the circuits.
3.They are going to stop putting up solar panels, so they don't make more energy during the day, and create more problems.
4.People probably don't like have the lights go out when they are at work and school during the day, so I don't think they have much choice. Otherwise, they would have to start wasting more energy, which is a bad idea.
5. I think that if Germany had some sort of giant energy storage thing it would solve their problem. They could store the solar energy for later use. The other option is that if their energy supply is reaching dangerously high levels that could cause a blackout they should just sell the energy to another country. Maybe they should learn to waste energy, like California, by installing air conditioners in all the bulidings and then they wouldn't have this problem. If the Germans learned to not be as good at using energy wisely, they wouldn't have a problem. They could always block out the sun like in the Simpsons.
First off i had no idea that germany was the lead source in solar energy. I always thought that no country would really use this source of energy because you can only get it in the day. Along with this i had no idea that this could cause blackouts, I would have thought this was an effiecient way to get electricity. Maybe by Germany using regular energy from fossil fuels and solar energy they can stop the blackouts and use energy efficiently.
ReplyDelete1. Germany is not using enough energy they collect in the day with solar pannels, which is causing blackouts.
2. Because it leads to blackouts
3. Stop putting up and using solar panels.
4. I think they could stop using some solar pannels and maybe incorperate other energys so that the blackouts dont happen to often.
5. I would use a differnt source of energy so i did not have blackouts.
http://www.khanfactor.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/192731121_54e8d5fdeb.jpg
heres a picture of solar pannels that cn collect energy.
This is ironic, the fact that a type of renewable energy can cause blackouts. One way to avoid this problem is to properly balance fossil-fuel usage and solar power usage. This way, blackouts could be avoided, and Germany would still have reliable energy.
ReplyDeleteNew quesion:
1. What is another plausible way for Germany to avoid the blackouts.
I agree with Miguel because everyone is always preaching that we need to use the renewable energy, how it is so important to our environment yet people in germany are complaining that using what everyone else is telling them to use is not working out for them and they find themselves between a rock and a hard place. Hopefully they can find alternative energy sources.
ReplyDeleteAnswer to Miguels question;
some of germany is on the coast, maybe they can use wave power there, they can reduce the amount of solar panels they use to avoid a blackout and things like that.