[cbmuser]

France is supplying electricity to all of its neighbors and they’re trading in the same market.

Thus, if electricity is scarse and expensive across Europe, French wholesale prices rise as well.

FWIW, the French government forces EDF to sell the electricity to its national competitors at a fixed price of around 50 Euro/MWh, IIRC.

[ravis11]

What everyone seems to be missing here is that in France alot of heating during winter is done with electricity which is not the case in germany. So peak electricity usage in France during Winter is much higher and that is the time where it needs to import alot.

[legulere]

Germany is a net-exporter of electricity

https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/germanys-energy-c...

[JPKab]

"Net exporter" doesn't really matter for the specific conversation at hand.

A better way to quantify grid health would be to identify periods of peak demand across northwestern/central Europe, and then tally who is selling power to whom at those inflated prices.

I have solar panels on my home, as do most of the homes in my neighborhood. However, we recently had to have a natural gas substation built adjacent to the community to deal with the demand surges coinciding with supply disruptions (every time it snows).

[hiram112]

Just out of curiosity, assuming your internal batteries are charged to the max (e.g. after a sunny day), about how long can you go if it starts snowing or is very cloudy, before you need to start pumping in natural gas?

Maybe my understanding of how it all works using your own solar panel and the neighborhood's gas lines is too simplistic, though, to answer.

[JPKab]

Like the vast majority of solar installations in suburban neighborhoods, none of the homes in my neighborhood have any battery paired with the solar panels.

The solar panels just feed power into the grid. This is the standard model used all over the Western US.

[TheSpiceIsLife]

I don't think the comment you replied to said anything about having batteries?