In his series on how German energy policy needs to change, Craig Morris has focused on keeping costs down, but today he talks about spreading them around fairly. The issue is not just industry exemptions, but also grid costs in general. In my last two posts on market failures, I talked about what needs to be changed for energy producers – both corporations and citizens/SMEs. Now, let’s talk about consumers. First, there are industry exemptions, and in a way we don’t need to worry about these much – if a new German coalition does not act, Brussels will force it to. Wholesale power prices are going down in Germany, making the country’s industry power prices more competitive. Nonetheless, the number of firms largely exempt from the renewable surcharge (they pay less than one percent of the 5.3 cents per kilowatt-hour) has tripled over the past few years. It now includes firms that cannot possibly go abroad in search of lower power prices, such as brown coal excavator Vattenfall Mining and a few municipal tram line … Continue reading Reforming the Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG) – Equitable cost-sharing