Most of the electricity in Germany still comes from conventional energy sources.

From July to September their share of the electricity feed-in rose slightly to 56.9 percent of the generated electricity volume of 118.4 billion kilowatt hours.

The Federal Statistical Office announced on Tuesday.

Jan Hauser

Editor in business.

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The most important energy source is coal: its share in the total electricity mix increased from 26.4 percent in the same period of the previous year to 31.9 percent.

This mainly offset the decline in natural gas, the share of which in electricity feed-in fell by more than a third to 8.7 percent.

The reason for this is likely to be the sharp rise in the price of natural gas.

The share of nuclear energy rose from 12.4 percent to 14.2 percent.

In the first half of the year, the majority of the electricity fed into the grid was generated conventionally, accounting for 56.0 percent, after 51.8 percent of the electricity in the first half of 2020 came from renewable energies.

The new government made up of the SPD, the Greens and the FDP wants to increase the proportion of electricity from renewable energies by 80 percent by 2030 and "ideally" then also take the coal-fired power plants off the grid.

From July to September, according to the new data, renewable energies now accounted for 43.1 percent of the electricity fed into the grid.

As a result, the share of green electricity continued to decline slightly.

Wind power, the second most important source of energy, contributed 16.6 percent to electricity generation.

Behind photovoltaics with 13.3 percent, biogas with 6.0 percent and hydropower with 4.2 percent.

The amount of electricity imported into Germany also increased by 13.6 percent from July to September compared to the same period in the previous year.

Above all, electricity imports from neighboring France increased, which more than doubled.

In contrast, the amount of electricity exported rose by only 8.9 percent.

This means that significantly more electricity was exported than it was imported.

Overall, 1.1 percent more electricity was fed into the grid from July to September.