Once a month Karsten Hinrichsen comes here to the nuclear power plant of Bokdorf, in Northern Germany, not far from his home village. His aim is to protest against atomic power. Hinrichsen, who works as a meteorologist, has done his bit for the environment by building his own wind turbine right in front of the power station at a cost of 250,000 euros. A symbol of clean energy but also an investment, as he explains. “For the past five years my wife and I have earned 2000 euros a month by selling wind energy back to the national grid.”

The electricity produced by this wind turbine is sold for 9 euro cents per kilowatt/hour. This is thanks to German legislation which guarantees a fixed price for renewable energy over a 20 year period. For large producers of electricity, such as the group Notus, which has built wind farms in the countryside around Berlin, this has made wind energy both profitable and competitive.”The wind is there to be used and is free of charge,” said Ingmar Bürger, managing director of Notus. “We are now seeing the cost of oil and coal skyrocket which means that, in the next one to two years, the price of wind energy will be less than that of conventional fuels.”

According to a survey carried out by the Green Party, at peak times during the day, wind energy is already cheaper for consumers than nuclear or coal-powered sources. This was a decisive argument for the party, when as part of the governing coalition in 1998, it passed a law phasing out nuclear power stations by 2022.

“People always talk as if atomic energy were cheaper,” explained Bärbel Höhn, deputy head of the Green Party parliamentary group. “But in fact for the consumer renewable energy has reduced the cost of energy overall.” From next year, producers of renewable energy will be able to compete directly with traditional energy forms, by negotiating their own price on the market. Wind energy clearly has a bright future. As long, that is, as it doesn't become a victim of its own success, believes Claudia Kemfert, energy specialist at the German Institute for Economic Research. “I think that by 2020, renewable energy could make up as much as 20 or 25 percent of all electricity produced. The key thing though is that we also have the necessary infrastructure which allows renewable energy to be fed back into the national grid.”

Today, 14% of Germany's electricity is produced using renewable energy, half of which comes from wind – a development which gives an inspirational boost to Hinrichsen and his fellow protestors.