Companies Worry Cost of Plan to Trim Nuclear, Fossil Fuels Will Undermine Competitiveness
All this and more was predicted by Rael Jean Isaac in the must read book:Roosters of the Apocalypse: How the Junk Science of Global Warming is Bankrupting the Western World (New, Revised and Expanded Edition) Paperback – November 25, 2013
WILSTER, Germany—In a sandy marsh on the outskirts of this medieval hamlet, Germany’s next autobahn will soon take shape.
The Stromautobahn, as locals call it, won’t carry Audis and BMW’s , but high-voltage electricity over hundreds of miles of aluminum and steel cables stretching from the North Sea to Germany’s industrial corridor in the south.
The project is the linchpin of Germany’s Energiewende, or energy revolution, a mammoth, trillion-euro plan to wean the country off nuclear and fossil fuels by midcentury and the top domestic priority of Chancellor Angela Merkel.
But many companies, economists and even Germany’s neighbors worry that the enormous cost to replace a currently working system will undermine the country’s industrial base and weigh on the entire European economy. Germany’s second-quarter GDP decline of 0.6%, reported earlier this month, put a damper on overall euro-zone growth, leaving it flat for the quarter.
Average electricity prices for companies have jumped 60% over the past five years because of costs passed along as part of government subsidies of renewable energy producers. Prices are now more than double those in the U.S.
“German industry is going to gradually lose its competitiveness if this course isn’t reversed soon,” said Kurt Bock, chief executive of BASF SE, the world’s largest chemical maker.