Secondly, energy != electricity. Coal is mostly used for central heating (a plant heats water, water is then transported to a whole neighborhood). Electricity is sometimes also produced, but usually not the primary reason for the plant to exist in the first place. Nuclear plants are usually used for generating electricity (in Germany). Germanys carbon problem is the heating infrastructure being dependant on fossil fuels (mostly gas), but it has no lack of electricity sources.
Thanks for stating your openmindedness re/ nuclear discussion, BTW, IME statements like this can really lift the whole level of discourse.
Yes, but when it comes to coal more down is more better. And if nuclear was still around I would hazard to guess that's what would have happened.
The graph I'm looking at is labelled "Installed net electricity generation capacity in Germany". Lower down there's a pie graph with shares, and coal makes up ~20% in gross electrical production.
It raised some interesting questions about priorities.