How did Uruguay cut carbon emissions? The answer is blowing

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How did Uruguay cut carbon emissions? The answer is blowing in the wind

[ https://www.npr.org/2023/10/06/11979542 ... ate-change ]

October 6, 20232:48 PM ET
By Erika Beras, Amanda Aronczyk, Keith Romer, Willa Rubin

23-Minute Listen . . .

Back in 2007, Uruguay had a massive problem with no obvious fix. The economy of this country of 3.5 million people was growing, but there wasn't enough energy to power all that growth. There was energy rationing, and people's power bills kept going up.

"It was difficult for us to cope," Ramón Méndez Galain remembers. "It was difficult to get electricity. For some time, we were beginning to have blackouts."

Méndez Galain had trained as a particle physicist. "When you are trained as a scientist," he says, "you are trained to see an unsolved problem, and [to try] to find an explanation and a solution. So I used, if you wish, my scientific skills I had developed in order to face this difficulty with the same strategy."

He started researching different potential paths for Uruguay's energy future and reaching out to experts he knew around the world. Ultimately, he wrote up an entire plan for how Uruguay could change its energy mix so that it relied almost entirely on renewable energy. There would be less pollution, it would be better for the climate, and, he thought, in the long run, it would be the most economical choice Uruguay could make.

And then one day, Méndez Galain received a phone call in his office.

"He said, 'Oh, hi Ramón," Méndez Galain recalls. "I've been reading what you said. I'm talking with the president, and we wanted you to implement that strategy.'"

The president of Uruguay had seen Méndez Galain's plan and was now inviting him to become Uruguay's new national director of energy. Méndez Galain accepted.

Countries all over the world have spent the last decade announcing lofty goals to reduce the emissions that cause climate change. In the United States, President Biden has set a goal to reach 100 percent carbon pollution-free electricity by 2035. But Uruguay has almost reached that goal already. In a typical year, 98% of Uruguay's grid is powered by green energy. . . .

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