Munich RE is a very little known company. Hidden away in Munich is easy to miss that is the biggest reinsurance giant in the world.
Now why they would get involved in Energy?
They face huge exposures to the insurance claims their insurance companies will have to pay out to address climate change catastrophes… See Katrina etc.
So now they want to go to Sahara and create the mother of all solar power plants.
Good on them, but a bit of concern for the natives is needed. Not the national governments but the Bedu and Tuareg people who are the only native Saharans and the only ones who don’t abide by the national borders and identities forced upon the shifting sands.
The Germans will have to remember Rommel’s words: The desert victory is but a mirage… of time.
Yet that is how they hope to mitigate their future risks…
They are getting together a consortium to produce massive solar energy…in Sahara.
Typical German engineering without the benefit of Rommel’s North African desert experience…
According to this article : They plan to turn Africa’s sunshine into Europe’s energy. June 16, 2009. Guardian: Twenty blue chip German companies are pooling their resources with the aim of …. producing Europe’s energy.
Why don’t they focus on producing energy locally is beyond me. A good mix of resources and various types of energy inputs would adequately take care of the European’s needs…
But we have to still think imperial dreams. Colonize Sahara, exploit the Arctic, use Greenland’s resources… All of these are sexier than doing your bit in your own backyard and thus creating the sustainable energy needed close to the point of consumption. Large infrastructure projects are notorious for pollution and causing more carbon than what they will eventually save us at least in the first decades of setting up to run and enjoy their benefits. Sadly that didn’t cross their mind, nor the loss of at least 35%-70% of the energy generated due to the great distance of the grid that the energy needs to travel. .
So the minds behind Munich RE Energy ”putch” are a bit on the deluded side of 1930′s thinking and should reconsider and focus on public policy, energy conservation, Cap and trade and support of the ecosystems globally by producing energy close at home with the whole garden variety of available energy schemes that are alternative and not polluting.
This might make Kaizer reluctant to come out again but that’s the idea.
Sounds like outsourcing Europe’s problems and creating further unrest in the desert…
International Agreement on Climate Treaty Seems Unlikely in 2009 …
