The next storm tide is sure to come.
"We put our crash helmets on and hid in the cupboard," an inhabitant of Moore, Oklahoma City, told news channel CNN. "And we prayed like mad."
In Germany, we have taken another direction. Renewable energies bucked the trend of global warming and contributed to climate protection with a CO2 reduction of 130 million tons since 1990 - second only to the amount saved by the collapse of the East German economy.
In the USA, experts are certainly observing the effects of the climate change felt in Oklahoma. "The Gulf of Mexico is demonstrably warmer, and it is the main engine for tornados that sweep inland from the ocean. These storms are more precisely called hurricanes. They get their energy among other things from the warm water, and the warmer it is, the more energy the storms can build up. Tornados on land are similarly driven by rising heat," says Professor Dr. Joachim Peinke, an expert on turbulence at Oldenburg University. He has observed an increase in severe storms in other regions as well. According to his latest studies, this is due to global warming.
But the USA continues to ignore this knowledge. And hopes the gas boom as a result of fracking will drag the country out of its economic and banking crisis with cheap natural gas.
EU Energy Commissioner Günther Oettinger has also failed to understand. Known as a longstanding supporter of subsidies for German coal and the use of "nuclear power for as long as possible", he argues through the EU Commission that "Germany should also recognise the potential of shale gas" to offer a "clean" solution for the federal government.
Arguing that excessively high electricity prices endanger Germany's competitiveness, he also demanded in an interview in FAZ newspaper: "At any rate we need a brake on the expansion of renewable energies".
His pronouncements in this field have been well-known for years. At CDU party conferences, he likes to make statements such as "That is why we don't need any decentralised idealists - they don't build gas pipelines from Baku. And soon electricity prices will threaten jobs."
Another example: "Nobody wants to take the train from Ulm to Stuttgart only when the wind happens to be blowing", a quote by the EU Commissioner at the Energy Forum of Ulm Chamber of Commerce. Doesn't Mr. Oettinger have a Bahncard (privilege card) for the Deutsche Bahn? Since April 2013, the German rail company has been advertising the card with the slogan: "Your Bahncard gets you to your destination with 100 % green electricity." With clean energy from the EWE AG wind farms in Krummhörn, northern Germany.
It's clear that discrediting the energy turnaround with the argument of high cost is back in fashion, including in top political circles. It is amazing how the truth is distorted here.
Germany's growing electricity exports are an effect of green electricity generation that is cheaper not only in the long term. They expose the lie of expensive eco-electricity, because especially foreign electricity customers buy German electricity because it is now often cheaper than home-generated nuclear or coal power.
Despite the shutdown of eight nuclear power plants, Germany exported more electricity in 2012 than ever before. The export surplus quadrupled compared to the previous year, reaching 22.8 terrawatt-hours.
What is missing is that the large energy utilities pass on to German consumers the shrinking procurement costs that result from more green energy generation, instead of simply adding to their profits. It is up to politicians to draw up proposals and reliable framework conditions that reduce the EEG levy in line with falling electricity prices on the market. This would ensure that households in Germany would benefit from the cost advantages of renewable energies.
In 2005, the British government passed plans to build new reactors with an output of 16 gigawatts by 2025 to replace old nuclear and coal power stations. 15 of the 16 British nuclear power plants will reach the end of their service life in the next 10 years, and the European industrial emissions directive means that old coal power stations must be shut down by 2017.
The French EDF group, one of Europe's leading energy utilities, has announced it is only willing to build new nuclear power plants if the purchasing price is guaranteed for decades.
The energy utility demands approx. 12 euro-cents per kilowatt-hour over 40 years, which would result in a revenue of EUR 110 billion. Currently, the British government offers around 11 euro-cents over 35 years. This means payments for nuclear power would be higher than those for wind and solar power in Germany, which are only guaranteed for 20 years.
This is further evidence that today renewable energies can already provide electricity much more cheaply - and safely - than new nuclear power plants.
Further reading:
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Wirtschaftsteil) vom 04. April 2013: Günther Oettinger im Gespräch „Deutschland setzt seine Wettbewerbsfähigkeit aufs Spiel“
Zeit Online (Wirtschaft) vom 14. Februar 2013: Fracking - Amerika im Gasrausch
Süddeutsche Zeitung vom 22. Mai 2013: Tornado - Wiederaufbau wird Milliarden kosten