In Europe, for the first time in six months, more electricity was produced from solar and wind than from fossil fuels. This was also the case in the Netherlands, according to reports from the energy research center Ember.

Electricity generated from solar panels and wind turbines has risen to 30 percent of total EU production in the past six months. At the same time, fossil fuel production has fallen to 27 percent. The rest is generated, for example, from hydro and nuclear power.

In thirteen EU countries, more electricity was generated from solar and wind than from coal and gas. This milestone was reached for the first time in Germany, Belgium, Hungary and the Netherlands.

Experts are optimistic about the speed of the energy transition. Newsur recently showed that China is playing a leading role in this:

Martin Visser, lecturer in energy transition at Hanse University of Applied Sciences, speaks of a significant event, but also adds a note. “It’s just about electricity. That’s 20 percent of our energy demand.”

Despite the increase in solar and wind power and the decrease in demand for electricity, the price of electricity is hardly going down, Visser says. “As long as there is a need for gas-fired power plants, the electricity sector will suffer from high gas prices.”

He explains that this is because the price depends on the most expensive means of generation, which are often gas-fired power plants. These resources are deployed when wind and solar are not available.

The bottleneck in solar and wind power is mainly storage. “At the moment, we can’t store electricity temporarily if demand is lower than production.” That’s unfortunate, says Visser, because it means we’re “throwing away” a lot of electricity.