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Costa Rica Has Gone 76 Straight Days Using 100% Renewable Electricity (vox.com)
Last year, Costa Rica powered itself using only renewable energy for 75 days. It has topped that feat this year. Vox reports: Costa Rica is pulling off a feat most countries just daydream about: For two straight months, the Central American country hasn't burned any fossil fuels to generate electricity. That's right: 100 percent renewable power. This isn't a blip, either. For 300 total days last year and 150 days so far this year, Costa Rica's electricity has come entirely from renewable sources, mostly hydropower and geothermal. Heavy rains have helped four big hydroelectric dams run above their usual capacity, letting the country turn off its diesel generators. Now, there's a huge, huge caveat here: Costa Rica hasn't eschewed all fossil fuels entirely. The country still has more than 1 million cars running on old-fashioned gasoline, which is why imported oil still supplies over half its total energy needs. The country also has cement plants that burn coal.
"The country also has cement plants that burn coal." So assuming they didn't go offline for 150 days, then they didn't actually go 100% on green energy.
Why did they lie? Oh I see, 'marketing speech'.
"The downside to hydropower is that it requires consistent rainfall. Though the dams in Costa Rica are now full, just months ago the country was suffering one of the worst droughts in its history. This forced Costa Rican utility companies to burn fuel to generate power, releasing greenhouse gases and causing rate rises. Even if Costa Rica were able to sustain 100% clean electricity production, the country still relies on petroleum for transportation, and emissions from this sector are the largest hurdle the country faces in reaching its carbon neutrality goal. The environment ministry reports that fuel burned by cars, buses and trains accounted for almost 70% of the country’s carbon emissions in 2014. According to customs there are only 200 or so hybrid cars in Costa Rica to take advantage of the energy produced by renewables on the grid.
The fact that even a country like Costa Rica, which has made major investments to produce clean energy, still struggles with these obstacles, shows just how difficult it would be for larger, more industrialised nations to follow in its footsteps.
With a population under 5 million and no major industry, Costa Rica uses much less power than most developed countries, and its geography of tightly packed volcanoes, rivers and mountains is more suited to producing clean power than most."
sauce: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/30/truth-behind-costa-rica-renewable-energy-reservoirs-climate-change
When they trot out these "feel good" stories about renewable energy, that this is a developing nation with an extremely temperate climate. Also remember this is the model for the United States and the rest of the modern first-world/western nations under globalism/leftism: reducing them to third-world status.
Don't be so pedantic, "hubris" comes from Ancient Greek, "hybris", therefore it is perfectly acceptable to write it with a y.
Linux is for people who don't mind RTFM.
With the exception of a few isolated communities (and the occasional voltage support from Burrard Thermal in Vancouver), British Columbia has run on hydro power for decades.
...si hoc legere nimium eruditionis habes...
The country still has more than 1 million cars running on old-fashioned gasoline
You mean they all just don't swing from vine to vine to get around? Who knew?
Solving Unix problems since 1989...
In our trip to the country, we stayed in a semi-permanent camp on the Pacific shore, which was not wired. In fact, there was no proper road to it either — the only way to get there was by (small) plane.
The camp had a generator, of course — a noisy affair, which they fired for a few hours each day to power up/recharge the radio and phones. But, hey, there are still places in the world, where even those evil devices — made from poisonous materials by exploited workers toiling in polluting factories — aren't known...
Some times the spurning of civilization is explained simply by absence of civilization...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Well, those people in the states are wrong. Hydro is renewable, like it or not. Renewable doesn't mean no impact on the population and ecosystems. All power sources have an impact.
Great that they can exist on renewables like this, mean it. But using an essentially non-industrial country in a temperate climate as an example is statistical bias at best, outright lying at worse. How many aluminum smelters, steel plants, large data centers, and other myriad large bulk power users exist in Costa Rica? You know, the things that allow humans to actually build a first world country capable of supporting a large urban population? Yeah, thought so.
I don't think Costa Rica is interested in invading another country nor has it been invaded except by folks enjoying its beaches and mild climate. Not sure how big the police force is but may be no larger than that of a big US city.
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act. George Orwell
Also to note Electric Cars are a luxury for the Rich of Americans and Europeans. This isn't old fashioned yet, because there isn't a wide scale replacement.
A flip phone is an old fashioned device, because most of the population have moved over to smartphones. However your iPhone 6 isn't an old fashion phone, just because the 7 just got released.
There are still a lot of gasoline cars being created in the market, with many companies without an all electric plan for their cars in any time in the future.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Hydro is claimed in renewable counts when making claims about performance. But when making claims about progress, its almost always credited to wind and solar expansion. Here we have very high perentage of electricity considered renewable, but almost none of that is wind or solar. So some will downplay the headline for that reason.
In reality, hydro is great for those countries that have the option, but its not a production growth capable technology as it gets harder and harder to get approvals to sequester the land and alter the water flow.
The problem with hydro is that it's impossible to build more dams in countries with environmental regulations, water rights laws and lawyers.
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We couldn't care less about your personal tastes. We will end up making you pay for your pollution, like it or not.
And also fuck you.
-the rest of the world
I think Iceland generates almost all of it's power from geothermal, to the point where most of the world's bauxite smelting is done there, and there's enough power left over for most citizens to pay a flat rate for electricity.
My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
Environmentalists won't allow new dams to built in the US and are actively trying to have old ones torn down.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
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Costa Rica's per capita GDP is 1/3 of that of the US, making it a fairly poor country. And if you want to find other countries that use little fossil fuel energy, just keep going down the list and look at the countries that are even poorer than Costa Rica.
Every country in the world was run on pretty much 100% renewable energy sources until the industrial revolution. That's neither something to brag about or something to aspire to.
It is common for rural areas to be disconnected form the grid and many small communities in Central/South America run off generators. I stayed at a surf/yoga camp in 2011 that was run off candles and generators, even though a place to tie into the grid was only a couple miles away.
When I ruminated about how a candle is probably a worse polluter than a 60W light bulb powered by a coal power plant, the crunchy ex-pat owner got pretty upset with me. I goolged it when we got home and sure enough, candles horrible for air pollution compared to light bulbs.
You have to heat the mixture (a man made combination of several minerals) to about 2,700 degrees F to get Cement.
hey wait, don't they have volcanoes in Costa Rica? So that pesky cement production problem is solvable.
Now to just get everybody switched over to electric cars.
And since someone inevitably brought up the energy storage with problem with renewables -- Costa Rica is also pretty close to the equator. Just run mass up the space elevator when the wind is blowing / Sun is shining. Then run mass down the elevator when you need more baseload power. Good grief, I can't believe I have to spell everything out for you. This isn't rocket surgery!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
My country (Paraguay) went 100% renewable after 1973, when the Acaray dam went operational and covered 100% of the energy needs of the country. In 1983 the world's largest operational dam (Itaipú) began to serve energy and we own 50% of it (with Brazil). We also own 50% of another large dam (Yacyreta). Now, and save for biomass-burning usines used in the Mennonite colonies at the far north, isolated Chaco area, we still are 100% covered by hydropower. There are plans to convert these biomass plants either to solar power or to lay down wires so they could use power from Itaipu. So, I would say that covering large energy needs with renewable power is totally possible, and we are proof of it since 1973.
-- Look to the Rose that blows about us--"Lo, Laughing," she says, "into the World I blow..."
He's probably a blathering moron, but probably one who works for a Government agency. After all "in general, hydropower is not even considered a renewable energy in most states or, for the most part, by the federal government". Yes, liquid falling from the sky, collecting in valleys and lakes, and tumbling down rivers is not a renewable resource.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
And how is hydroelectric renewable? Can they make it rain? I used 100% renewable money last month, I won the lottery!
Hydro is the most important of the renewables by far, but Greens only count it when they brag about the energy output of rainy countries. At other times, hydro is the energy source they loved to hate the most before nuclear came along.
Along with lots and lots of primarily lead acid batteries for storage.
You want to know where a good proportion of that lead ends up when batteries reach end of life?
You want to know what lead does to the environment? The Wildlife? The People?
Ah, but no, its all pure shiny pretty warn nice solar power! Ignore the realities.
Did you ignore the link in thread you were replying to? Here it is again: http://www.npr.org/sections/pa...
"The plant consists of five big industrial windmills and two lakes. On windy days — and there are plenty — the windmills harness the Canary Islands' Atlantic gusts. When production exceeds demand, such as at night, excess energy is used to pump water from a sea-level lake up into a natural volcanic crater half a mile uphill. When the wind dies down, the water is released down through a pipe connecting the two lakes. On its way, it passes through turbines, which generate hydro-power. Everything is connected with sensors so that within five seconds of the wind dying down, the hydro portion of the plant kicks in. For island residents, the lights don't even flicker."
I don't think the lake is made out of lead acid batteries...
The energy to make them is paid back in 2-4 years, and they last 30 years. That's in Australia, which is roughly the same distance from the Equator as Sri Lanka.
http://www.solarchoice.net.au/blog/news/solar-energy-myth-buster-1-they-take-more-energy-to-manufacture-then-they-will-ever-generate-161209/
You're welcome. No charge. I educate idiots every day.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Lithium only makes up around 2% of the battery. It is not a significant contributor to the price.
This post is encrypted twice with ROT-13. Documenting or attempting to crack this encryption is illegal.
Surely you are joking.
The desert in California is full of the stuff in salt lakes and there is a huge salt lake in Bolivia with enough for centuries of current lithium usage in that lake alone. That Bolivian lake is so big and so flat that it is used by satellites to calibrate their altitude measurements.
Access? It has around a dozen rusty locomotives parked on it. If they could get there then getting the salt out isn't so hard.
Mining? Lithium is "mined" by bulldozer, backhoe and truck.
The current price is an artifact of the small number of suppliers. If it continues to rise then that will motivate others to look at the deposits that are not being used at the moment.
it is old fashioned, its old tech by a long way. its a newer version of coal burning but its now in the "old tech" bracket.
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