Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by gbil 2367 days ago
While not German I need to highlight the fact that in Germany power generation relies much less to fossil and nuclear than in the US, roughly 1/3 less (~30% compared to ~82%, see links below) That makes Germany a bit more advanced on the generation part but also more expensive - without going into the nuclear debate here. So it is not apples to apples comparison at the end of the day

https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3 https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/germanys-energy-c...

2 comments

But Germany appears to rely on Coal more than the USA for power generation.

Coal is the largest source of electricity in Germany. As of 2016, around 40% of the electricity in the country is generated from coal. Germany has been opening new coal power plants until recently, following a 2007 plan to build 26 new coal plants

Compare the energy pie chart for Germany vs USA. (Add brown coal and hard coal percentages)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_the_United_States

> As of 2016, around 40% of the electricity in the country is generated from coal.

As of 2019 this is 28%.

> Germany has been opening new coal power plants until recently

While closing many older ones.

> following a 2007 plan to build 26 new coal plants

Which it didn't.

That's fine, but I used the German parent poster's energy prices in my calculations, and the Tesla was still cheaper per mile.
I should have clarified probably that I was referring to this part of your post: >Assuming Germany's electric infrastructure is as advanced as that in the US (I hope!), then that reduces the Tesla's cost to about 2c/mi.