Fiscal Cliff Deal Extends/Improves 12 Alt-Energy Credits

[Trakar]

German wind power runs at 17% of rated capacity...because that's how much the wind blows.

They're not getting much bang for their buck, are they?

Not having the backup gas plants destabilizes the grid, and an unstable grid is what led Germany's neighbors to install cut-offs at their borders. Why should Poland go dark because Germany was short-sighted?

Actually, rated capacity is an assessment based upon a collection of variables, wind availability is but one of these variables and often the least important one, though to be fair, most of Germany's richest wind farm areas are saturated, further land-based wind harvest is definitely in the arena of diminishing returns. (btw- according to all of the studies I've seen Germany has averaged almost 21% of rated capacity over the last 5 years.) This is certainly lower than the German goal of 32% but that should improve dramatically as the additional offshore farms start coming online over the next year. There is no recorded instability problems in their neighbors, the neighbors are crying foul because cheap German renewable power is undercutting their ability to build hew state-sponsored nuclear power reactors, and undercutting their ability to sell their own more expensive power to other nations because of Germany's much cheaper renewables energy.