[freeflight]

> Case in point: closing nuclear plants and replacing them with renewables is what Germany has been trying to do and has failed to do so far.

Germany was the global top electricity exporter, by dollar value, in 2017 [0]. If that's what "failing" looks like, then maybe more countries should start "failing" like that?

In that context, coal and gas are only stop-gap technologies until storage technology and deployment has caught up, and coal is mostly only around for the same reasons as in the US: To not piss off the miners/lose those jobs.

[0] http://www.worldstopexports.com/electricity-exports-country/

[Faark]

The talking point i usually hear against this is "germany exports the huge fluctuation in production caused by green energy to the eu grid, straining the entire system". I haven't come across a good argument against this. Import/Export does indeed seem to vary widely based on time of day [0]. But this doesn't mean there are negative effects. Net frequency might be a better indicator, but I haven't found good graphs, yet.

> coal is mostly only around for the same reasons as in the US: To not piss off the miners/lose those jobs.

Totally agree, especially lignite heavy regions don't have a lot of other industry.

[0] select "import, export" at https://energy-charts.de/power.htm?source=all-sources&year=2...