Germany was the first major economy to make a big shift in its energy mix toward low-carbon sources, but it is failing to meet its climate goals of reducing carbon dioxide emissions even after committing to spend over $580 billion by 2025 to overhaul its energy systems. The nation’s emissions miss should be a “wake-up” call for governments everywhere.

Germany stepped up as a “leader on climate change” by phasing out nuclear and pioneered a system of subsidies for wind and solar that sparked a global boom in manufacturing those technologies.

Germany’s emits about 905 million metric tons of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases which is about two percent of the world’s contributions. Contrary to its climate goals, over the last two years, Germany’s have risen for the second year in a row.

Like Germany, America’s renewables are becoming an increasing share in electricity generation, but at a high cost. The emission reduction goals have increased the costs of electricity and transportation fuels and may be very contributory to America’s growing homelessness and poverty populations.

Power prices in Germany are among the highest in Europe—yet many customers continue to support the switch to renewable energy sources. Today, German households pay almost 50% more for electricity than they did in 2006. Much of the increase is the renewable surcharge, which has increased over the same period by 770%.

In California, the state that is trying to set emission standards for the world, and as in Germany, households are paying about 40% more than the national average for electricity, according to 2016 data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

For fuel, Californians continue to pay almost $1.00 more per gallon than the rest of the country due to (a) the state gasoline sales tax, which is among the highest in the country; (b) refinery reformatting costs; (c) cap-and-trade program compliance costs; d) low-carbon fuel standard program compliance costs; and (e) renewable fuels standard program compliance costs.

California is an “energy island” to its almost 40 million citizens, bordered between the Pacific Ocean and the Sierra Nevada Mountains. The state’s daily need to support its 145 airports (including 33 military and 10 major and over 100 general aviation) is 13 million gallons a day of aviation fuels. In addition, every day the 35 million registered vehicles, of which 90 percent are not EV’s (electric vehicles), consume 10 million gallons of diesel and 42 million gallons of gasoline. All that expensive fuel is a heavy cost to consumers.

Despite higher energy bills, public opinion has remained supportive of the energy transition and the strategy to cut emissions. That support is apt to shift when politicians resolve the debate about how their targets match reality. Either they will have to abandon the goals and live with more pollution than they’ve promised, or they will have to force through painful and expensive measures, a further limit to emissions.

Germany, like California, is also trying to phase out nuclear reactors. In 2013 California shut down the 24/7 nuclear generating facility of SCE’s San Onofre Generating Station, which generated 2,200 megawatts of power. It will close PG&E’s Diablo Canyon’s 2,160 megawatts of power in 2024.

Shutting down nuclear plants is leaving California, like Germany, short of 24/7 generation plants that can work on windless and dark days when wind and solar factories won’t provide much to the grid—and demand is at its peak. Yet to be determined is the impact on rate payers. Will there be more reliance in California and America on fossil fuels for 24/7 power?

California is the world’s 5th largest economy and contributes less than the one percent of the world’s GHG emissions. The other 49 states in America are contributing significantly less and should be concerned about the unintended consequences of the climate goals of both Germany and California and the higher costs imposed on their citizens.

Germany’s failure to meet its climate goals should be an ominous wake-up call for California, America, and governments everywhere struggling to reach their own targets.

Subsidizing investments in low power-density wind and solar to obtain intermittent electricity from their huge land mass requirements results in higher costs of electricity and fuels to consumers. The unintended consequences are that the climate goals of Germany and California spur growing homelessness and poverty.

[This article is adapted from one that first appeared on the CFACT website September 24, 2018, and is reproduced here by permission.]