Implications of the Energiewende for the Power Sector

Abstract

The Energiewende is the "political-technical-industrial" project of energy transition that Germany has initiated and that will foreseeably last for decades. This energy transition, a matter of considerable controversy, has its roots in the proposals of the seventies, reinforced in the nineties and launched "globally" in the last decade. This project was already the subject of a report by the Chair of Energy of Orkestra (Álvarez Pelegry & Ortiz Martínez, 2016). It addressed the energy situation in Germany and examined the objectives of the Energiewende from various points of view. The purpose of this report is to deepen the implications of the Energiewende in the electrical field advanced in the previous report. The content is divided into two basic chapters. In the first chapter, the energy and environmental implications of Energiewende are presented in three sections. The first is dedicated to the study of electricity generation and demand; the second analyzes the evolution and forecasts of the price of electricity in the wholesale market; the third analyzes the environmental implications of Energiewende, both in terms of greenhouse gases (GHG) and polluting emissions. For its part, the second chapter examines the economic implications for the electricity sector, in two sections. The first studies the price of electricity for consumers and the second studies the impact of Energiewende on electricity companies as well as the strategic changes they have addressed to adapt to the changes.