At a Berlin trade fair for sustainability, a new gadget caught Waltraud Berg’s eye — a solar panel small enough to be easily installed on the side of a balcony and then plugged into a wall socket to feed energy produced by the sun directly into her home.
“I was absolutely thrilled to learn that such a thing even existed, that you can generate your own power and be more independent,” said Ms. Berg, a retiree who installed several panels on the south-facing balcony of her Berlin apartment by herself.
Each of the lightweight panels produces only enough electricity to charge a laptop or run a small refrigerator. But in homes across Germany, they are powering a quiet transformation, bringing the green revolution into the hands of people without requiring them to make a large investment, find an electrician or use heavy tools.