Latin & Central America Divided Between Oil and Green Energy

The competition grows fierce between oil and green energy in Latin & Central America.

With billions of dollars in fuel subsidies and tremendous renewable energy systems both installed and in the pipeline, Latin America is a continent divided. In a region where energy demands are expected to double within the next fifteen years, each country has taken a dramatically different approach to preparing for upcoming spikes in energy usage.

Venezuela has some of the largest fossil fuel supplies on Earth, whereas Uruguay and Costa Rica are making strides towards generating 100% of power from renewables.

oil and green energy

Source: https://www.giz.de/en/worldwide/13518.html

Throughout the region, from Chile to Brazil and Mexico, other governments are also developing and implementing plans to become the first country to hit the 100% target. The commonality is that in many cases, wind largely dominates the market, solar plays a smaller role and fossil fuels usage continues to be subsidized.The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) predicts that wind and solar could provide 20% of Latin American’s electricity needs by 2050. With this in mind, the IDB Climate Change Specialist Gerard Alleng reminds us that progress is slow – nearly twice the amount of funds is invested into fossil fuel subsidies as into renewable energy.

To read more about the development renewables and the road to achieving 100% renewable energy, click here.