Germany struggles to transform its power supply

New York Times : Germany is behind schedule on a plan proposed by Chancellor Angela Merkel to expand its renewable energy sources. Since pledging to drop nuclear power last year in the wake of the earthquake and nuclear meltdown in Japan, the German government has been sidetracked by the euro crisis and a series of regional elections. In addition, transforming the energy supply to draw increasingly on wind, water, solar, and thermal sources will require an expansion of the energy grid, at a cost of billions of euros and mountains of paperwork to grant the necessary permissions. Yesterday network operators met to propose a timetable for upgrading the 4400 km of existing power lines and the building of 3800 km of new ones that will be needed for Merkel’s plan to work.