The Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (ISE) has presented the latest figures for renewable energy in Germany. They show that wind, solar and hydroelectric power plants contributed over 40% of the net electricity generated for the first time last year.

Around 111 terawatt hours (TWh) were produced from wind energy, making it the second-largest source of energy, behind lignite. Onshore power plants delivered around 87.4 TWh, while offshore production accounted for about 18.8 TWh. German photovoltaic plants fed around 45.7 TWh into the grid, which corresponds to an increase of 16% over 2017. Because of the dry summer, water energy contributed only 17 TWh of the electricity generated, which is the second lowest figure for 30 years.

Electricity generation from lignite power stations accounted for around 131.3 TWh in 2018, which was about 2% less than in 2017. Coal-fired power stations supplied 75.7 TWh, which represents a fall of 7.4%, while gas provided about 40 TWh, a reduction of 9.1%. Nuclear power plants produced approximately 72.1 TWh of electricity in 2018, about the same as the previous year.