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Too little and too late, Israel is beginning to understand the importance of renewable energy - Walla! news

2020-10-30T18:05:48.813Z


The government has set a target of producing 30% of electricity through natural processes within a decade. Along with the joy of a possible change in approach to the issue, claims were made that the threshold agreed upon was too low, and the auditor's report found that previously set goals had not been realized. "It's hard to overcome a 20-year gap in one day"


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Too little and too late, Israel is beginning to understand the importance of renewable energy

The government has set a target of producing 30% of electricity through natural processes within a decade.

Along with the joy of a possible change in approach to the issue, claims were made that the threshold agreed upon was too low, and the auditor's report found that previously set goals had not been realized.

"It's hard to overcome a 20-year gap in one day"

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  • renewable energy

  • Ministry of the Environment

  • Ministry of Energy

  • Yuval Steinitz

  • Gila Gamliel

Yoav Itiel

Friday, 30 October 2020, 19:54

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Photography: Shlomi Gabay, Editing: Itai Amram

The government decided this week on a target of producing 30% of electricity in Israel from renewable energy by 2030. In addition, it has set an intermediate target of 20% by the end of 2025. Energy will be based mostly on solar and to a lesser extent on wind, and the rest will be produced from natural gas.

At the same time, there was criticism that the goals were not satisfactory, and that previous goals that had been set had not been realized at all.



Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz, who announced that he was considering the new target about a year ago, called it "ambitious."

However, the truth is that it is not higher than those set by other countries in the world.

The EU, for example, set a target in 2018 according to which 32% of electricity consumption in 2030 will be based on renewable energy, and Egypt set itself a target of 22% in 2022 and 32.5% in 2030 in 2016.

The energy will be mostly based on the sun (Photo: ShutterStock)

"The sun's radiation that falls on the earth in an hour can be enough for the annual consumption of all mankind," said Nobel Laureate in Chemistry Walter Cohen in a lecture he gave in 1999 at Bar Ilan University.

The Land of Israel is blessed mainly with the sun but also with the wind, and these are the two main sources of renewable energy, one that is produced from natural processes, and whose sources are not perishable.



This is in contrast to the burning of polluting fossil fuels such as coal and oil, natural gas or nuclear fission, the most common energy sources in the world today, the use of which reduces the energy reserves within them.

At the core of this trend is the global understanding that perishable energy sources will not remain forever, and this must be prepared for through the diversification of energy sources.



With the advancement of technology, it is possible to generate electricity from renewable energies at a price similar to its production from natural gas.

The State Comptroller's report on promoting renewable energy and reducing dependence on fuels, which examined the various government ministries and was published this month, showed that the cost of generating electricity in 2019 in a solar farm project initiated by the Ministry of Finance was 18.18 cents, compared to 71.1 cents.

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A report by the Knesset Research and Information Center submitted to the Economics Committee a few weeks ago states that the goals set so far have never been achieved, and no longer-term goals have been agreed upon, despite government interest in the issue that has stretched over decades.

It also emerged that Israel currently does not have a strategic plan for promoting renewable energies and a medium- and long-term work plan for its realization.



In January 2009, the government decided to set a guiding target for the production of electricity from renewable energy in the amount of 10% of energy needs.

In July 2011, the government decided on an intermediate target of 5% of energy needs for 2014. According to the auditor's report, a comparative examination against the set targets reveals gaps of 58% and 50%, respectively, between the target and the implementation.

At the end of the audit, the auditor found that there is a policy document on energy economy targets for 2030 but there is no master plan for the energy sector, "although the Ministry of Energy has tried to advance in the past two decades."

Voted against the proposal.

Gamliel (Photo: Reuven Castro)

The shuffle is coming despite the fact that promoting electricity generation through renewable energy and reducing the use of fossil fuels, which will reduce air pollution in the country, is a national goal of the State of Israel and is bound by international agreements it has signed, including the Paris Agreement.



The Ministry of Energy promises that the decision will fundamentally change the mix of fuels in the Israeli economy, at the expense of natural gas and diesel-backed power plants, and will position Israel as one of the leading countries in the West in solar energy production.

The benefit to the economy from this move could reach eight billion shekels a year.

Opposition from the Ministry of Environmental Protection

"The new target for solar energy, of 30%, is a real revolution. This means that in the next decade we will have to triple the construction of new solar facilities," Steinitz said in reference to the government's decision.

He announced that towards the end of the process, in about seven years, "Israel may reach the first place in the world in the amount of electricity produced from solar energy."

Steinitz promises that the moves will reduce more than 90% of the air pollution emitted from about 20 power plants throughout Israel.



Minister of Environmental Protection Gila Gamliel believes that Steinitz's goals are not ambitious enough.

It claims that "in order to put Israel on a par with other advanced OECD countries, a target of 40% electricity generation from renewable energy must be set by 2030."

According to her, "already today it is possible to reach close to 50% of electricity production from solar sources in the built-up area."

Gamliel opposed the government's decision and voted against it.



Indeed, according to the work of the Ministry of Environmental Protection on the potential for solar electricity generation in the built-up area in Israel, within a decade about 46% of Israel's electricity consumption can be generated in photovoltaic facilities located in built-up areas, on roofs and facades of buildings and above public parking rule.

According to the Electricity Authority's assessment, this has even greater potential.

In addition, comprehensive work by the Heschel Center for Sustainability and the Israeli Energy Forum presents an outline for generating 52% of Israel's electricity consumption from renewable energy by 2030, and about 95% of electricity consumption by 2050.

"May reach number one in the world."

Steinitz (Photo: Yossi Weiss)

But all of these need to be weighed against the actual achievements.

While at the end of 2019 about 27% of the world's electricity production was from renewable energy, in Israel this rate in 2019 was only about 6%, a target set by the government for 2014. In the 2016 government decision the Accountant General in the Ministry of Finance was tasked with examining solar panels. Government office buildings.



The director of housing in the Accountant General's Department manages about 6,500 buildings with a total roof area of ​​about 2.5 million square meters.

It is estimated that using them to generate electricity from solar energy can save more than a quarter of a billion shekels a year.

However, the State Comptroller's report finds at the end of the audit that there are no photovoltaic installations on the roofs of government buildings at all.



Photovoltaic solar technology is the main technology for generating electricity from renewable energy in Israel today, and according to the Research and Information Center, it will probably be the main technology in the future as well, since the sun is the main natural resource for energy in Israel.

This technology can be applied to buildings in built-up areas and other built-up areas such as reservoirs, parking lots and interchanges, and in large solar fields that are built in open areas.



Facilities in the built-up area are smaller, usually require subsidies and provide less electricity per hectare than large facilities in the fields.

However, they save land, a resource that is in short supply in Israel, do not require extensive and expensive infrastructure development of the transmission network, and do not harm open spaces.

The move will reduce the use of power plants.

The station at Ruth Junction (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Progress in wind energy production in Israel is also delayed.

This is despite the fact that solar energy production and wind energy production are usually done at different times, and in fact they complement each other.

Photovoltaic facilities operate during the day, and peak production is at noon.

Under wind conditions in Israel, wind turbines produce energy throughout most of the day, but especially in the evening and at night, and peak production during the winter season.

Meanwhile, three wind turbine farms are operating in Israel, which together supply a negligible amount of about 26 megawatts - in Tel Asanya, Ramat Sirin and Ma'ale Gilboa.



The disadvantages of wind energy, which are also the causes of under-application, are disruption to flight safety and security system activity, damage to wing owners, health effects, keeping distance from development or development areas, local resistance and damage to the landscape.

The State Comptroller's report shows that the process of approving plans for the establishment of large wind energy projects lasts an average of about four years.

It was also found that the treatment of other plans whose approval procedures have not yet been completed, the scope of which is considerably smaller than those already approved by the planning committees, lasts an average of three years.



The Comptroller noted that in order to meet the objectives, the Ministry of Energy, the Electricity Authority, the Israel Land Authority, the Planning Director and the Ministry of Finance, together with the other relevant ministries, must act to remove the barriers and deficiencies in the report.

"Too little and too late"

Adam Teva VeDin also said that "the increase in targets is too little and too late. It is time for the State of Israel to move forward with meeting the goals it has set for itself and first and foremost ensuring an electricity grid that can contain such amounts of renewable energy."

They added that "a percentage fixation of gas (70%) is a cry for generations. A dynamic goal must be pursued that relies on renewable energies and not gas. In addition, efforts must be made to save on the use of electricity by energy efficiency."



Yoni Sapir, founder of the "Forum for Clean Energy", is also one of the opponents of the plan approved by Minister Steinitz in the government.

"The Ministry of Energy's plan will determine Israel in the next decade for the production of 70% of electricity through polluting gas energy, under the guise of 'promoting renewable energy in the electricity economy.' Who is excited about us and may disrupt all our lifestyles. "

He said, "The deployment and construction of solar facilities in fertile areas should be promoted, with the addition of storage facilities."

"Percent fixation of gas - crying for generations."

Whale rig (Photo: Albatross)

Prof. Yossi Rosenox, Dean of the Faculty of Engineering and founder of the Center for Renewable Energy at Tel Aviv University, which has 50 research groups in seven faculties, explained that "only 10% coverage of the Negev in photovoltaic systems, which convert solar radiation into electricity, can provide The electricity consumption of the State of Israel. "

However, Sage said that "it is of course for the sake of scale because it is not security-wise to put all energy sources in one place and it is also technologically and economically incorrect."



The Center for Renewable Energy says that two technological obstacles currently prevent the implementation of such a program: the need to store solar energy for night hours and cloudy days, as well as far-reaching changes that will be required in the national electricity grid.

Researchers at Tel Aviv University have enlisted in the scientific and national mission, and they face these challenges, along with many other issues in the field of renewable energy.



According to Prof. Rosenox, "the main reason for Israel's lag behind the world is the bureaucracy. After that, there is also a lack of budget allocation. It is reminiscent of what happened with water desalination. For many years the state did not want to invest in it, because the treasury is not run in the long run."

He says that "the Ministry of Environmental Protection's target for 50% production from renewable energies by 2030 is unrealistic. In the past, targets have been set and not met."



He added that "I would also like 100% but it is not possible. Many other countries that compare to them produce electricity hydroelectrically. If the government meets the target of 30% production from renewable energy and 30% -40% from natural gas then the mix is ​​not bad, and if more then "Good in general. It's hard to overcome a gap of 20 years in one day."

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Source: walla

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