The accident at the Japanese nuclear power plant "Fukushima" in March 2012 once again confirmed the high danger of nuclear energy. German Chancellor A. Merkel, who used to be an active supporter of the development of the "peaceful atom", said that it is impossible to continue working in the previous regime - the tragedy in Japan should become a turning point in the energy development strategy.
First, in Germany, the 7 oldest nuclear power plants built before 1980 were stopped for safety checks. As a result, it was decided not to launch them at all. The remaining 9 reactors will be shut down by 2022. The government was prompted to this decision by numerous demonstrations of opponents of nuclear energy.
Of course, such a technologically developed country cannot do without electricity, so a decision was made, on the one hand, to develop alternative energy sources, and on the other, to reduce electricity consumption by 10% by 2020 by increasing the efficiency of its use and introducing new standards for electrical appliances. For the development of alternative energy sources will be allocated 9 trillion. Euro.
Wind power plants are one of the options for replacing nuclear power plants. Wind energy is renewable, its processing does not harm nature. It is economically more profitable to use wind turbines to provide electricity to small objects, because it is not possible to control the direction and strength of the wind. This problem can be solved by accumulating and then distributing energy to consumers. In Germany, at the end of 2010, wind turbines provided 8% of all electricity generated.
Another promising direction is the conversion of solar energy into electrical energy. This method is generally available and environmentally friendly. Electricity can be stored to avoid interruptions in the supply at night and in cloudy weather. In order not to occupy the ground for solar panels, they are installed at a certain height, for example, on the roofs of buildings. The problem of the high cost of photovoltaic cells is also being successfully solved - their price is reduced by about 4% per year. The total power generated by solar power plants in Germany in 2010 amounted to almost 17.5 GW.
