First half of 2024 - almost 60% of Germany's energy needs will be covered by renewables!

The coverage of electricity consumption by renewable energies has risen to 59% every month since April 2024. More than half of consumption was also covered in the previous months. Compared to the previous year (2023), this is an increase of 6%. This growth can be attributed in particular to photovoltaic systems and wind energy.


Electricity generation from renewable energies in figures

A total of 252 billion kWh of electricity was generated in the first half of 2024. Of this, 150 billion kWh was generated from solar, wind and other renewable energy sources, an increase of 25% on the previous year.

More specifically, 76 billion kWh were generated by wind turbines on land and at sea alone, making wind energy the most productive area of renewable energy. PV systems generated around 37 billion kWh of electricity in the first half of the year. This result was significantly influenced by the record expansion of solar installations in 2023. In addition to PV systems, 12 billion kWh were also generated by hydropower plants, a figure that has risen sharply compared to previous years.


Tasks for the future

While the expansion of renewable energies is bearing its first fruits, the focus must now be placed on expanding the electricity grids and developing storage units, according to Kerstin Andreae, Chairwoman of the BDEW Executive Board. Andreae is alluding to the inconsistent energy generation from wind and solar energy. According to her, the German government should pave the way for energy generation from climate-neutral hydrogen in order to sufficiently secure electricity generation, even if wind and solar energy cannot be generated.

In addition, the Managing Director of the ZSW, Prof. Dr. Staiß, emphasized that the successes in power generation from renewable energies illustrate that an almost 100 percent greenhouse gas-neutral power supply is possible by 2035. However, he pointed out that value creation in the production of renewable energy systems currently takes place almost exclusively outside Germany and Europe. It is therefore important to bring the production of key technologies such as photovoltaics, wind energy and battery technologies to Germany in order to reduce supply dependencies on non-European countries.

Source: zsw-bw.de, 01.07.2024
Image: Serge Le Strat on Unsplash