Since the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war, Germany has immediately joined the ranks of sanctions against Russia, which has directly led to Russia's fierce retaliation against Germany in terms of natural gas supply. Today, Russia has been "cutting off gas" to Germany every other day, making Germany complain bitterly. How to survive this winter is a huge problem facing the German government and the German people.
Russian natural gas accounts for 55% of Germany's total demand. Although Germany can import natural gas from the Middle East and the United States, this will cost them higher costs. This cost is unsustainable in the eyes of the Germans. In this case, Germany is forced to abandon the so-called environmental protection concept and start restarting thermal power plants.
According to the German News Agency in Berlin, German energy operator Unibo recently announced that they will restart the Heiden coal-fired power plant in Petershagen, western Germany, from August 29, and the initial operation time is expected to be until the end of April 2023. There is no doubt that this move is used to alleviate the energy shortage faced by Germany this winter.
Germany plans to restart thermal power plants, but this has caused fierce opposition from domestic environmental protection organizations. Germany was one of the most environmentally friendly European countries at the beginning, but now it has "fallen" to the point of restarting thermal power plants. Not only domestic organizations oppose it, but international environmental organizations also have a negative attitude.
In addition to coal-fired power, nuclear power is a stable and clean energy source. Therefore, after abandoning coal-fired power, many countries have focused more on coal-fired power. However, Germany also has nuclear power plants, but Germany plans to shut down nuclear power plants in its territory and completely stop using nuclear power resources in 2022.
In fact, Germany was not so averse to nuclear power at the beginning. Since 1969, Germany has vigorously promoted the development of nuclear power in its own country. By 2011, Germany had built a total of 36 nuclear reactors, and nuclear power contributed 25% of Germany's total power generation.
The root cause was the 2011 Japanese earthquake and the Fukushima nuclear accident, which frightened Europeans and caused the German people's trust in nuclear power to plummet. Germany's anti-nuclear power sentiment was very intense. In the two weeks after the Japanese nuclear accident, Germany closed 8 nuclear power plants in a row. In the days that followed, Germany has also been cleaning up its nuclear power plants and will completely remove them in 2022.
In order to replace natural gas energy from Russia, Germany is also actively seeking other alternatives. Germany's hydropower development is okay. There are 5,500 hydropower stations in the country, but they are all small hydropower stations with a power of less than 1,000 kilowatts, mainly in the hands of private individuals and small businesses.
In the field of wind power generation, Germany is also in decline. Since 2016, Germany's wind power industry has cut nearly 60,000 jobs, and the number of newly installed wind turbines has also decreased for many years.
According to German scientists, if Germany's local solar energy is fully developed, it can provide a large amount of electricity supplement. However, things are not as smooth as they expected. The factor in Germany's development of the solar energy industry is the shortage of labor. Industry experts say that only to achieve the current expansion goals of the German photovoltaic industry, it will need to add about 50,000 workers, but these workers are currently nowhere to be seen. Not only that, high-end talents are also scarce.
And they found that China is the largest supplier of solar energy, and China is a global leader in both production capacity and technology. EU documents show that by 2025, all new buildings and existing buildings with energy consumption levels D and above should be equipped with rooftop photovoltaic equipment. China is a major exporter of rooftop photovoltaics, and naturally becomes the priority option for EU photovoltaic construction. 90% of the UK's rooftop photovoltaic products come from China, and even 95% of solar panels are made in China.
In terms of photovoltaic manufacturing, China's photovoltaic industry is leading the world. In the context of global energy transformation, China's photovoltaic industry has become the backbone of it, and it also plays an important role in energy supply. At present, China's photovoltaic industry has the most complete supply chain in the world, from silicon materials to components to photovoltaic products. As of the end of 2021, China's production of polysilicon, components, cells and silicon wafers accounted for more than 70% of the global production.
At this time, the German media was deeply concerned about the energy crisis caused by the Russian-Ukrainian war. On the one hand, they were worried that Germany's dependence on Russian energy could not be eliminated, and on the other hand, their dependence on China's solar industry was irreplaceable. They believed that Germany could not lose China.
In other words, if Germany wants to develop solar energy as an alternative energy source, it cannot do without China. But the reality is not optimistic. The United States began to push the EU to boycott China in the Trump era. Germany's joining the technological siege against China means taking a series of measures to restrict Chinese companies' technology business in Germany. These measures include strengthening supervision and review of Chinese companies, restricting Chinese companies from entering important areas of Germany, and strengthening intellectual property protection of Chinese companies in Germany.
In this case, Germany needs China to continue to provide high-quality products, but also wants to contain China from all aspects. This is undoubtedly a very contradictory situation. And the reality is much more serious than imagined.
German energy expert Alexander Lahr said that as the Russian-Ukrainian conflict continues, the EU has imposed multiple rounds of sanctions on Russia. Under the backlash of sanctions, Europe's energy crisis will be further exacerbated; instead, the United States will reap the benefits. Today, the United States' influence in Europe has further expanded, and Europe is increasingly dependent on the United States in the economic, security and political fields.
Not only that, the entire West has fallen into a self-made recession, and the entire world is in an intense stage of transformation, and the energy crisis is only part of it. Under the provocation led by the United States, the world has been forced into a camp that supports or opposes the hegemony of Europe and the United States. But it is obvious that the West has not gained any benefit from this. If the West lacks confidence and ultimately fails to overcome this difficulty, or falls into recession as a result, then it will be its own fault.