SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN AIMS AT DOUBLE WIND, 100% NEW ENERGY

North German State to Double Wind Energy on Land; Conservatives Increasing New Renewables from 50% to 100% of Electricity, Highest Concentration of Wind in Germany…
Paul Gipe, February 21, 2011 (Wind-Works)

"With one of the highest concentrations of wind generating capacity in Europe--if not the world--the north German state of Schleswig-Holstein plans to double the amount of wind energy it generates from wind turbines on land.

"In the spring of 2010, the Conservative government approved a state energy policy that doubles the amount of land area devoted to wind energy. The policy also sets a state target of meeting 100% of its electricity consumption from renewable energy by 2020. Most of that will come from wind energy."

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"…Schleswig-Holstein meets more than 50% of its 12 TWh of electricity consumption with new renewables, mostly wind energy and on-farm biogas. Wind turbines currently occupy 0.75% of the state. The new law sets aside 1.5% of the state's land area for wind energy, or double the amount of land currently used.

"Like Germany's federal government, Schleswig-Holstein is ruled by a coalition of the conservative Christian Democratic Union (Christlich Demokratische Union
Deutschlands), and the neoliberal Free Democratic Party (Freie Demokratische Partei). About the size of the US state of Connecticut, Schleswig-Holstein is the northernmost Land, or state, in Germany, bordering Denmark on the north and Hamburg and Niedersachsen (Lower Saxony) on the south. The state is one of the windiest in Germany, straddling the German portion of the Jutland peninsula between the windy North Sea on the west and the Baltic Sea on the East…"

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"…[The German system of renewable energy feed-in tariffs enables development of the most suitable renewable energy technology, be it a rooftop solar PV system, a biogas plant on a farm, or community-owned wind.] The success of this strategy now transcends political party boundaries and ideologies, as evidenced in Schleswig-Holstein.]…[where] land area is only 4% of California's, but it generated 5 TWh in 2009 from wind energy-as much as the Golden State. Wind energy alone generates more electricity in Schleswig-Holstein than coal, oil, and natural gas combined (4.4 TWh). Only nuclear generates more electricity (12 TWh)…[A]s in Denmark, most of the wind turbines, solar panels, and biogas plants in Schleswig-Holstein are locally owned…

"… Within five years, the ruling conservatives expect wind generating capacity to increase from the current 3,000 MW to nearly 5,000 MW…Equally striking is the plan to nearly triple solar photovoltaics (PV) by 2015 from 540 MW in 2009 to 1,400 MW--as much as was installed in the US through 2009…On-farm biogas…generated nearly 1 TWh in 2009 from more than 300 plants. By 2015 Schleswig-Holstein expects to have 300 MW in operation from more than 600 plants….[O]nly 50 MW [are] in operation in the US from 150 plants…The population of Schleswig-Holstein, 2.8 million, is less than 1% of that of the US, and about 10% of Canada's 35 million inhabitants…[W]ith a land area of only 16,000 square kilometers, [Schleswig-Holstein] is less than half the land area of Denmark …[but] now has more than twice the wind-generating capacity per square kilometer as Denmark, more than any other German state, nearly eight times more than Iowa, and 32 times more than California…"