Due to rising gas prices in Germany, more brown coal is being burned again, which is considered the most environmentally harmful. The redirection of LNG to Asia and the seizure of the Suja gas measuring station by the Ukrainian Armed Forces led to the fact that stone fuel is again profitable to use for electricity generation.
"The recent rally in European gas prices has helped improve the economy of German power plants that run on brown coal," Montel reports, citing market participants.
"Brown coal is currently in the money, and businesses are hedging (hedging prices and risks)," said one German trader.
At least, the newspaper notes, the more active use of brown coal has become one of the reasons why European carbon emission quotas have risen in price by 15% in recent weeks and reached 74.75 euros per ton.
"About 60% of German combined cycle gas turbines are currently unprofitable. There were 25% of them in May," said Tobias Federico, managing director of Montel Analytics.
Power plants burning brown coal, which is the most polluting type of coal, have again taken a dominant position in the order in which the regulator orders their launch to meet demand in the country.
"Germany needs on average about 30 GW of power plant capacity during the year to meet the demand for electricity, which is not covered by renewable energy sources," writes Montel.
According to Montel Analytics estimates, currently brown and coal-fired power plants dominate the first 13 GW. This is almost twice as much as in May.
Information about the more active use of brown coal is also confirmed by data from the Institute of Solar Energy Systems named after. Fraunhofer's. Thus, the share of gas generation decreased by almost 2% over the past month to 9.4%, and the share of brown coal generation increased by 4% to 18%.
As EADaily reported, since July, gas prices in Europe have increased by more than 25% - up to $ 460 per thousand cubic meters. At first, the reason was the redirection of LNG cargoes to Asia, where they pay more for gas. Next, on August 6, the Ukrainian Armed Forces launched an attack on The Kursk region and under their control came the Russian gas measuring station "Sudzha", through which the entire transit of Gazprom through Ukraine goes. In recent days, however, the price of gas has been declining. Deliveries for a month in advance from the TTF hub fell to $ 415.