Greenpeace Energy sells fossil fuels while fighting nuclear power. After it became a scandal, Greenpeace officially divested and changed the name but they still share the same office building in Hamburg so I think it’s more than fair to say they are strongly ideologically aligned.
I’m sure on paper they would rather renewable than fossil, but they clearly are willing to compromise with them, unlike with nuclear. When they combine forces with the openly pro-fossil fuel lobby right wing, you get the exact mess Germany is in: inexcusably high reliance on gas and a consistently worst-in-class CO2 footprint per kWh for Western Europe.
Yes, I’m extremely bitter about this. The environmentalist political class being unyielding on nuclear but soft on gas set us back more than a decade with the green transition.
Thank you for your reply. I was not aware of that. However I do think that there is a nuance between a selling natural gas product (for heating) vs. electricity produced with natural gas. Greenpeace did the former, because there was/is no way to get enough green gas at the moment. I think this is legitimate, because at the moment that’s the case for every natural gas provider. Then in the future they can transition with their already client base. To be clear Greenpeace never sold non-renewable electricity.
Nonetheless is extremely disappointing that it takes so long and I also understand if current customers feel betrayed.
Does anyone know if there is a better natural gas provider with a higher percentage of green gas in the mix?
Biogas and hydrogen are both greenwashing products. Neither is better than electric alternatives where they are being sold. They have major major flaws that the fossil fuel industry (y’know, the one selling both of those products) won’t advertise to you:
Biogas is derived from agricultural products. All the agricultural waste we produce can’t cover a meaningful part of even just our heating needs. This inevitably leads to a major misincentive to grow crops just to turn into methane, like we are doing with bioethanol, which has catastrophic land-use and environmental impacts.
Hydrogen is very inefficient to produce. Most often produced with gas (lol), but even if produced through electrolysis it’s less efficient to have a double conversion than just use the electricity directly. It is also very hard to store/transport safely and efficiently.
Regardless of any of the above, heat pumps have a COP of 3-5. A boiler has a COP of 1. I don’t care how clean your fuel is, it will always be more efficient to burn it in a regular power plant to power a heat pump than to burn it in a boiler.
And even if the above wasn’t true and biogas was awesome (it’s awful), the simple fact that they are selling trace amounts in order to promote fossil gas as their main product is an obvious act of greenwashing unto itself.
Greenpeace knows all of the above very well. I can’t say for sure that they are corrupt and bought out by the fossil fuel industry. All I can say is that I don’t have a better explanation for their stupidity.
I am still not convinced. I am a big fan of heat pumps (especially the large one they have in Denmark), however not everyone has the luxury to choose their heating solution. Greenpeace doesn‘t make the laws which make landlords not transition away from fossil fuels.
So Greenpeace is offering the best in-class “green” natural gas product. You didn‘t name another provider, which is better. May be there is one. You can‘t really critize the best for not being even better, because there are obviously reasons for it or someone else would have already done better.
Secondly even though we we will not need that green gas infrastructure for personal heating in the longterm, because there is much better option available (the heatpump), there are certain industries which need it badly. These are the steel, chemical and aviation (in that order). Therefore it is important to bootstrap green hydrogen generation additionally to what is already being done.
At last let me emphasize that what Greenpeace is doing is not ideal. Ideally the government would follow a plan where personal natural gas heating would not be needed, because heat pumps would be installed everywhere.
Greenpeace Energy sells fossil fuels while fighting nuclear power. After it became a scandal, Greenpeace officially divested and changed the name but they still share the same office building in Hamburg so I think it’s more than fair to say they are strongly ideologically aligned.
I’m sure on paper they would rather renewable than fossil, but they clearly are willing to compromise with them, unlike with nuclear. When they combine forces with the openly pro-fossil fuel lobby right wing, you get the exact mess Germany is in: inexcusably high reliance on gas and a consistently worst-in-class CO2 footprint per kWh for Western Europe.
Yes, I’m extremely bitter about this. The environmentalist political class being unyielding on nuclear but soft on gas set us back more than a decade with the green transition.
Thank you for your reply. I was not aware of that. However I do think that there is a nuance between a selling natural gas product (for heating) vs. electricity produced with natural gas. Greenpeace did the former, because there was/is no way to get enough green gas at the moment. I think this is legitimate, because at the moment that’s the case for every natural gas provider. Then in the future they can transition with their already client base. To be clear Greenpeace never sold non-renewable electricity.
Nonetheless is extremely disappointing that it takes so long and I also understand if current customers feel betrayed.
Does anyone know if there is a better natural gas provider with a higher percentage of green gas in the mix?
Biogas and hydrogen are both greenwashing products. Neither is better than electric alternatives where they are being sold. They have major major flaws that the fossil fuel industry (y’know, the one selling both of those products) won’t advertise to you:
And even if the above wasn’t true and biogas was awesome (it’s awful), the simple fact that they are selling trace amounts in order to promote fossil gas as their main product is an obvious act of greenwashing unto itself.
Greenpeace knows all of the above very well. I can’t say for sure that they are corrupt and bought out by the fossil fuel industry. All I can say is that I don’t have a better explanation for their stupidity.
I am still not convinced. I am a big fan of heat pumps (especially the large one they have in Denmark), however not everyone has the luxury to choose their heating solution. Greenpeace doesn‘t make the laws which make landlords not transition away from fossil fuels.
So Greenpeace is offering the best in-class “green” natural gas product. You didn‘t name another provider, which is better. May be there is one. You can‘t really critize the best for not being even better, because there are obviously reasons for it or someone else would have already done better.
Secondly even though we we will not need that green gas infrastructure for personal heating in the longterm, because there is much better option available (the heatpump), there are certain industries which need it badly. These are the steel, chemical and aviation (in that order). Therefore it is important to bootstrap green hydrogen generation additionally to what is already being done.
At last let me emphasize that what Greenpeace is doing is not ideal. Ideally the government would follow a plan where personal natural gas heating would not be needed, because heat pumps would be installed everywhere.