Land of Windmills, Germany

I was brought up to believe that Holland was the land of windmills. This has now changed at least in my mind. One thing that struck me as we were flying across Germany is the number of windmills generating electricity across the country. It seemed that on every small hill there were a few of the white mills churning out electricity. When we think of wind farms here in Alberta, we think of 50 or a hundred wind mills in a giant wind farm in southern Alberta. In Germany it is common to see little groups of 2 or 3 to a dozen wind mills clustered on hill tops. In the North Sea and the Baltic there are larger wind farms taking advantage of the steady ocean breezes.

Why is it that Germany has so many wind mills? When you consider the population of Germany, about 80 million in an area half the size of Alberta, you begin to see that as far as pollution and climate change they were up against the wall and needed to make changes to how they lived. Germany brought in legislation to encourage renewable, clean energy sources. As soon as you produce a watt of clean energy, German law requires that you are paid a price that is higher than that of conventional, polluting energy. An interesting note is that the Green Party first elected members to the German parliament about 20 years ago. It was pressure from them that help bring many of the most progressive environmental laws in Germany today.
Germany is dedicated to working towards a first goal of 25% clean energy and within a few years they will achieve this. One way this has been possible is through net metering, which allows small producers to sell clean energy back to the grid. Also many of the wind mills are privately owned by individuals or a small group of investors. In Canada we are still working on the larger industrial model for wind farms with these being build and run by larger corporations.

We have alot to learn about clean energy production in Alberta. Germany has become the world leader in clean energy and when the time comes they will be profiting from us buying their technology. Back in the 1990's a Danish firm wanted to set up a factory and research facility to build wind mills in southern Alberta. Ralph Klein sent them packing, probably to protect the interests of his buddies in the fossil fuel industry. Alberta could have been the world leader in the wind industry, but like so many other progressive opportunities, we couldn't see the light at the end of the tunnel.