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Update on global solar and inside “24/7 renewable Germany” – with Charlotte Senkpiel & Sonia Dunlop

Update on global solar and inside “24/7 renewable Germany” – with Charlotte Senkpiel & Sonia Dunlop

The smarter E Podcast vor 2 Wochen

with Charlotte Senkpiel & Sonia Dunlop

0:00

30:39

Podcast

The smarter E Podcast

265 Episoden

For and With Creators of the New Energy World

Wissenschaft Technologie Wirtschaft

Podcast aneignen

The Dunkelflaute has become one of the most persistent arguments
against a fully renewable energy system. When the sun isn’t
shining and the wind isn’t blowing, where is our energy supposed
to come from?

Detailed new modeling from Germany’s Fraunhofer ISE suggests
these “dark doldrums” are a challenge – but should not be enough
to halt the energy transition. The bigger challenge to be
overcome is how the flexibility needed to manage low-renewable
energy periods can be embedded into the country’s energy system.

Recorded at The smarter E Europe 2026 in Munich, host Jonathan
Gifford speaks with Fraunhofer ISE senior scientist Charlotte
Senkpiel about what it would take for Germany to reach climate
neutrality with wind and solar at the heart of its energy system.
And the result is not only good for the climate, it’s
economically viable.

The outcome of the Fraunhofer ISE study goes well beyond simply
building more renewables. Batteries, electric vehicles, flexible
demand, strengthened and smarter grids, international
interconnectors, and dispatchable backup all have roles to play –
while electrification dramatically reduces Germany’s dependence
on fossil-fuel imports.

And when prolonged periods of low wind and solar do arrive? The
modeling shows how batteries, demand flexibility, electricity
imports, and a limited use of hydrogen or synthetic-fuelled
generation can work together to keep the system running.

In the second part of the podcast, Global Solar Council CEO Sonia
Dunlop joins the episode to discuss the push to unlock
agrivoltaics and rooftop solar worldwide – and why she believes a
near-term slowdown in global PV deployment doesn’t change solar’s
mid-term trajectory.

What the episode crystallizes: a 24/7 renewable energy system is
about building an energy system flexible enough to handle the
variability of wind and solar, and how it’s cheaper to do so.

️ Questions, comments or suggestions? Reach us at
podcast@thesmartere.com