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posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday January 03 2018, @07:01AM   Printer-friendly
from the making-money-from-home dept.

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

Germany has spent $200 billion over the past two decades to promote cleaner sources of electricity. That enormous investment is now having an unexpected impact — consumers are now actually paid to use power on occasion, as was the case over the weekend.

Power prices plunged below zero for much of Sunday and the early hours of Christmas Day on the EPEX Spot, a large European power trading exchange, the result of low demand, unseasonably warm weather and strong breezes that provided an abundance of wind power on the grid.

Such "negative prices" are not the norm in Germany, but they are far from rare, thanks to the country's effort to encourage investment in greener forms of power generation. Prices for electricity in Germany have dipped below zero — meaning customers are being paid to consume power — more than 100 times this year alone, according to EPEX Spot.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/25/business/energy-environment/germany-electricity-negative-prices.html


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  • (Score: 0, Flamebait) by khallow on Wednesday January 03 2018, @11:49PM (3 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday January 03 2018, @11:49PM (#617424) Journal

    Ditch the power regulation, and you create something like Enron and the rolling blackouts that California suffered.

    Pennsylvania and Texas didn't have those problems when they deregulated their markets. California regulators created the problem: power generation heavily restricted in California so a massive amount of power needs to be supplied from neighboring states; the "spot" market (market for in day power needs) was mandated for most power consumption - the distribution utilities couldn't buy contracts to avoid using the market excessively (this created the fertile grounds for market manipulation that Enron exploited); and California regulators looked the other way for months until it got so bad (with two of the big three companies in bankruptcy) that the governor (who probably was bribed to look the other way) had to intervene.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 04 2018, @01:35AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 04 2018, @01:35AM (#617455)

    and enron was a cia front so wtf does it have to do with the "free market", as if we have one in the first place.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 04 2018, @07:43AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 04 2018, @07:43AM (#617576)

    Shirley, you fuck-all idiot khallow, living where you live, you are familiar with the demise of Montana Power? The hated corporation that was the spawn of Rockefeller and Anaconda Mining Company? Are you a shill for 19th century Robber Barrons, as well as the more recent versions? Or just ignorant of history? Inquiring minds want to know, khallow!!

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday January 04 2018, @12:44PM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday January 04 2018, @12:44PM (#617642) Journal
      Nope. And since it is irrelevant to the subject, I'm not feeling the interest in doing so. I can't know everything so I don't bother trying.