“Storm in the Northwest”

Nowhere in Germany are the effects of the energy transition more visible than in the Northwest, the centre of the country’s wind power industry, writes Volker Kühn in Nordwest-Zeitung. “With wind power’s stormy expansion on and offshore, the region has become the Energiewende’s centre, in a good and in a bad sense,” Kühn says. Wind power creates jobs, bolsters the local municipalities’ budgets, and provides clean energy – “thereby blemishing the nature it is supposed to rescue” he argues. But a cap on wind power expansion in the region due to lagging grid adjustment and the switch to auctions for the support of new projects could turn the tide in the Northwest. The job boom might only be sustained if German wind power companies manage to expand their activities abroad, Kühn writes.