Since July 2014, Uruguay’s state power utility, UTE, has 30 100 percent electric vans. After the success of this initiative, it doubled that number in its fleet of vehicles, and incorporated two electric cars, in November 2015. Credit: Verónica Firme/IPS

By Veronica Firme
MONTEVIDEO, Nov 17 2015 (IPS)

Uruguay is modifying its energy mix with the aim of achieving carbon neutrality by 2030, by means of a strategy that bolsters non-conventional clean energy sources through public-private partnerships and new investment. A majority of this South American country’s energy already comes from renewable sources.

“By the end of 2014, this country’s energy mix was made up of 55 percent renewable sources, compared to a global average of just 12 percent,” said Ramón Méndez, the president of the National Climate Change Response System, during a meeting on renewable energy.

Furthermore, 94 percent of electric power comes from renewables, he said, in a country which is only responsible for 0.06 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions, which cause global warming.

The transformation of Uruguay’s energy mix began during the first term (2005-2010) of the current president, Tabaré Vázquez, although the country was not starting from zero in terms of renewable sources, Gonzalo Abal a physicist with the Solar Energy Laboratory of the University of the Republic of Uruguay, said in an interview with IPS.

Thanks to hydropower, a significant proportion of Uruguay’s energy already came from renewables. But hydroelectricity is vulnerable to the effects of climate change.

Traditionally, the country depended on four old hydroelectric dams, three of which were built on the Negro River between the 1930s and the 1970s. The fourth is on the Uruguay River, shared with neighbouring Argentina, and was built in the 1970s.

In addition, two ancient thermal plants powered by fuel oil have served as a back-up when the hydropower supply drops or collapses due to water shortages. The last time this happened was in 2004.

This Southern Cone country of 3.3 million people has fully exploited its large hydropower sources, and began to turn towards wind power and later biomass, the two clean energies around which the greatest progress has been made, according to data provided by the experts and documents consulted by IPS.

The transformation of the energy mix required a legal framework, which included authorisation for clients connected to the low voltage grid to generate electric power from renewable sources – wind, solar, biomass or mini-dams – with a potential of no more than 150 kilowatts.

Also approved were several initiatives like the 2005-2030 Energy Policy, or the 2015-2024 National Energy Efficiency Plan, adopted on Aug. 3.

The Energy Efficiency Plan is aimed at reducing energy consumption in all industries and sectors of the economy, but especially in residential areas and transportation, which will be responsible for 75 percent of the total accumulated reduction by 2024.

In addition, the Investment Promotion Law was modified to offer tax breaks so that at least five percent of the investment in any given project goes towards renewable energy, for the goal of cleaner production.

Uruguay has 16 medium-sized and large wind farms, like this one in the northern department of Tacuarembó. The country already has 670 MW in installed wind power capacity and a similar amount under construction, which means that 30 percent of demand for electric power will be covered by wind energy by late 2016. Credit: Ana Libisch/IPS

The state power utility, UTE, is responsible for the generation, transmission, distribution and sale of electricity to the 1.2 million clients distributed throughout Uruguay’s 176,215 square kilometres of territory.

UTE has a monopoly over energy distribution but not generation, which the private sector is also involved in, which made it difficult to include power generation in the government’s energy strategy goals.

As of late 2014, Uruguay had a total installed capacity of 3,719 MW, including generators connected to the national power grid as well as stand-alone power systems, according to the Ministry of Industry, Energy and Mining.

The supply consisted of 1,696 MW of thermal energy (from fossil fuels and biomass), 1,538 MW of hydropower, 481 MW of wind power and four MW of solar power, says the National Energy Balance 2014 report.

Breaking down the installed power capacity by source, 66 percent came from renewable sources (hydroelectricity, biomass, wind and solar), while the remaining 34 percent came from non-renewable sources (gasoil, fuel oil and natural gas).

In the economy, there was a structural shift in the energy consumption mix since 2008, which has remained unchanged for the past seven years. Industry is the biggest consumer (39 percent), followed by transportation (29 percent), residential (19 percent), commerce and services (eight percent), and lastly agriculture, fishing and mining (five percent).

From 2007 to 2014, industry overcame transportation, which was pushed to second place, driving up biomass consumption. Pulp mills played a decisive role in that, because thanks to biomass they became 90 percent self-sufficient in energy, as part of the transformation that began in 2005.

In this country, “the important change came in regard to wind power – that is where changes became necessary and challenges were addressed,” Gerardo Honty, an expert with the Latin American Centre for Social Ecology, told IPS.

Wind energy is in full expansion, “and we are nearing one gigawatt (1,000 MW) of installed capacity,” said Abal.

With respect to solar energy, “we have a 50-watt plant already in operation – that’s 100 hectares of solar panels – and a second 50-MW plant has begun to be built, with investment from Europe,” said the academic.

“The rest of the plants, around 15, are smaller, between one and five MW, and are distributed throughout the north of the country,” Abal added.

Connecting with the neighbours

Uruguay is diversifying its energy sources, but it can also “expand the grid in geographic terms; if you interconnect with Argentina and southern Brazil, the probability of having an atmospheric event that leaves you without wind power in the entire area of the pampas is very low,” said the physicist.

The national power grid has interconnections with Argentina (2,000 MW) and with Brazil (70 MW, currently being expanded to 500 MW). The latter has been delayed because the two countries’ power grids operate on different frequencies, and conversion capacity must be added to overcome the problem.

In Uruguay, “the problem isn’t the electric power industry but combustion engines that cannot run on the renewable sources mentioned,” said Honty.

Transportation, especially public transit, poses the big future challenges.

The Montevideo city government is studying the possibility of purchasing autonomous electric vehicles for the sake of energy efficiency and because they do not emit greenhouse gases while at the same time they reduce noise pollution, economist Gonzalo Márquez with the department of mobility said in a forum on energy.

But no timetable has been outlined yet, he told IPS, because there are difficulties to work out like the cost and maintenance of the vehicles, the driving range of the batteries, and the subsidy for public transport, “a hidden cost that society assumes.”

Uruguay projects that when the transformation of its energy industry is complete, greenhouse gas emissions will be 20 to 40 times lower than the global average, said Méndez, the top official in the government’s climate change response office.

This country also aims to be carbon neutral by 2030. That means “our target for that year is for the CO2 (carbon dioxide) that we absorb to be greater than what our entire economy emits,” he said.

Edited by Estrella Gutiérrez/Translated by Stephanie Wildes

Deforestation is one of the main sources of greenhouse gas emissions by the Global South, such as in this area of Rio Branco in the northern Brazilian state of Acre. Credit: Kate Evans/Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR)

By Diego Arguedas Ortiz
SAN JOSE, Oct 5 2015 (IPS)

Seen for years as passive actors in the fight against global warming, more than 100 countries of the Global South have submitted their national contributions to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and decarbonising their economies.

With differing levels of ambition and some targets conditional on international financing, the commitments assumed by developing economies put pressure on the big global emitters of greenhouse gases (GHG) and reinforce the ethical stance that the phenomenon of climate change requires contributions by all countries, said experts consulted by IPS.

“We’ve seen a number of strong commitments from Global South countries in spite of their small role in creating this challenge,” said Ellie Johnston, the World Climate Project manager at Climate Interactive, a U.S.-based organisation that helps people see what works to address climate change and related issues.

In their national contributions, developing countries have focused on clean energies, the fight against deforestation, the need for new forms of financing, and the design of climate change adaptation strategies.

A total of 146 governments met the Oct. 1 deadline to submit their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) for cutting GHG emissions, while 49 failed to do so.

The INDCs that were presented are not enough to keep the global temperature rise to two degrees Celsius with respect to pre-industrial levels – the limit set by experts to avoid climate catastrophe.

The country climate pledges are to be incorporated into the new universal binding treaty to be approved at the 21st yearly session of the Conference of the Parties (COP21) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), to be held Nov. 30 to Dec. 11 in Paris.

An analysis by Climate Interactive found that the national contributions to date would result in expected warming of 3.5 degrees Celsius by 2100

Another estimate, by the Climate Action Tracker, predicted that the combination of government climate action plans, if implemented, would bring global warming down to 2.7 degrees Celsius.

The differences in the estimates arise from the different methodologies used, mainly with regard to emissions from China and India after 2030 – the two emerging powers that in the last two decades have become the world’s first and third largest emitters of GHG. The second is the United States, the fourth Russia, and the fifth Japan.

“Our analysis shows that more ambitious contributions are needed across the Global South and Global North to ensure we reach the internationally agreed upon goal of two degrees C, and we hope that the Paris climate talks will create a framework that ensures this can happen,” Climate Interactive’s Johnston told IPS.

Some of the governments presented ambitious targets. And one thing that stood out was clear objectives for adaptation, one of the most important elements for the Global South, a term that refers to the diverse range of developing countries in Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Asia.

An increase in clean energies and a reduction in fossil fuel use are part of the commitments assumed by the countries of the Global South to cut greenhouse gas emissions. The photo shows a wind farm in the La Paz y Casamata mountains near the capital of Costa Rica. Credit: Diego Arguedas Ortiz/IPS

Johnston celebrated the presentation of commitments by the emerging economies, and said that given the disparity between historic responsibility and action-taking capacity, industrialised countries should step up their contributions.

The division between industrialised and developing countries is a basic part of the UNFCCC, because of their different levels of responsibility in generating the phenomenon of climate change.

But after COP20, held in Lima in December 2014, all countries committed to contributing to curbing global warming, by means of the INDCs.

In the crucial Paris conference, negotiators will have to combine the INDCs presented by each country in the new binding climate treaty, which will enter into force in 2020, with the goal of keeping the global temperature rise below two degrees Celsius by 2100.

“When viewed from an equity and fairness perspective there are quite a few that have gone beyond what we could consider as their fair share, especially among the smaller LDCs (Least Developed Countries) and SIDS (Small Island Developing States), who are least responsible for the causes of climate change,” Tasneem Essop, the head of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) delegation to the UNFCCC climate talks, told IPS.

The South African activist said the problem with the INDCs is that in Lima, clear standards were not set for their design.

Costa Rica pledged to limit its per capita emissions to 1.19 tons by 2050, and the hope is that the global average will be no more than two tons per capita. Cameroon is to cut its emissions by 32 percent, with respect to the level it would have in 2035 at the current rate of growth, but like many other countries, it clarified that to reach that goal, it would need international financing.

Papua New Guinea, where the logging industry is powerful, will focus on combating deforestation and on land-use change, its main problem.

Brazil, meanwhile, proposed to reduce emissions by 37 percent by 2025, with respect to 2005 levels, and it is one of the few countries of the South to present “absolute targets”.

“The problem we have, and this applies to all the INDCs and not just Global South countries, is that these INDCs have not been developed on a common framework or with common standards. So it makes it very difficult to compare,” said Essop.

The countries that failed to meet the deadline for the submission of INDCs included some with more limited technical capacity to draw them up, and others that the experts considered the least motivated to take action. The list of countries that did not present INDCs includes Bolivia, Iran, Malaysia, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Venezuela.

Essop stressed that the commitments assumed by the Global South should keep in mind the balance between the three principal elements of climate action and the new treaty – mitigation, adaptation and means of implementation – where internal and external financing play an essential role.

“An important and interesting feature in some Global South countries’ INDCs has been the clarity in terms of what the country can fund domestically and what actions can be enhanced with support,” said Essop.

In 2009, industrialised nations pledged 100 billion dollars a year by 2020 to finance the struggle against global warming. But the funds have been slow in coming. “Finance will not be an issue that is resolved until the final night in Paris,” said Kat Watts, Global Climate Policy Advisor for Carbon Market Watch.

Watts told IPS that the old divisions in the climate negotiations – Annex 1 and Annex 2 industrialised countries, and the rest of the countries in a separate group – are crumbling under the weight of the INDCs and other actions.

The British analyst said it was important that the submission of the national climate pledges and the approval of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), at a Sep. 25-27 U.N. summit in New York, had happened at the same time.

“The INDC and SDG processes both happening this year means that there is a real opportunity for each country to consider how to make any planned development both low carbon and resistant to predicted climate impacts,” said Watts.

Edited by Estrella Gutiérrez/Translated by Stephanie Wildes

Globally, coal production and coal power account for 44 percent of carbon emissions annually. Credit: Bigstock

By Suganthi Singarayar
SYDNEY, Mar 11 2015 (IPS)

With less than a year to go before the United Nation’s annual climate change meeting scheduled to take place in Paris in November 2015, citizens and civil society groups are pushing their elected leaders to take stock of national commitments to lower carbon emissions in a bid to cap runaway global warming.

Industrialised countries’ trade, investment and environment policies are under the microscope, with per capita emissions from the U.S., Canada and Australia each topping 20 tonnes of carbon annually, double the per capital carbon emissions from China.

“Without changing our energy choices, we are not going to be able to act effectively on climate change.” -- Fiona Armstrong, convenor of the Climate and Health Alliance (CAHA)
But despite fears that a rise in global temperatures of over two degrees Celsius could lead to catastrophic climate change, governments around the world continue to follow a ‘business as usual’ approach, pouring millions into dirty industries and unsustainable ventures that are heating the planet.

In Australia, coal mining and combustion for electricity, for instance, has become a highly divisive issue, with politicians hailing the industry as the answer to poverty and unemployment, while scientists and concerned citizens fight fiercely for less environmentally damaging energy alternatives.

Others decry the negative health impacts of mining and coal-fired power, as well as the cost of dirty energy to local and state economies.

Globally, coal production and coal power accounts for 44 percent of CO2 emissions annually, according to the Centre for Climate and Energy Solutions.

Australia’s reliance on coal for both export and electricity generation explains its poor track record in curbing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) reporting last year that Australia’s 2010 carbon emission rate was 25 tonnes per person, higher than the per capita emissions of any other member of the organisation.

Counting the cost of coal: The case of Hunter Valley

A report released in February by the Climate and Health Alliance (CAHA), a coalition of 28 organisations working to protect human health, concluded that the “estimated costs of health damages associated with coal combustion for electricity in the whole of Australia amounts to 2.6 billion Australian dollars [197 million U.S. dollars] per annum.”

CAHA’s convenor, Fiona Armstrong, told IPS that CAHA aims to draw attention to Australia’s health and energy policy in light of its heavy dependence on fossil fuels.

“Without changing our energy choices, we are not going to be able to act effectively on climate change,” she contended.

She pointed out that the Hunter Region, one of the largest river valleys on the coast of New South Wales, is one of the most intensive mining areas in Australia.

“It’s responsible for two-thirds of our emissions,” she explained, “So it’s a good example […] to see what the impacts are for people on the ground, [and] also to see what the contribution of coal from that community has on a global level.”

Hunter Valley produced 145 million tonnes of coal in 2013. Keeping in mind a conversion rate of 2.4 tonnes (2.4 tonnes of carbon dioxide emitted for each tonne of coal produced), experts say that coal mined in the Hunter Valley in 2013 produced the equivalent of 348 million tonnes of carbon dioxide.

According to the NSW Minerals Council, mining in the Hunter Region employs over 11,000 fulltime workers. It contributes 1.5 billion Australian dollars in wages and contributes 4.4 billion Australian dollars to the local community through direct spending on goods and services, as well as to local councils and community groups.

But these riches come at a high price.

The Hunter Valley is known for its vineyards, horse studs and farming areas, all of which are threatened by extensive mining in the region.

Addressing a community meeting in the inner Sydney suburb of Glebe this past February, John Lamb, president of the Bulga Milbrodale Progress Association, spoke about the cost of mines on local communities, and the uncertainty wrought by their inability to fight against the rampant growth of the industry.

Lamb’s Association previosly fought the expansion of the Mount Thorley Warkworth coal mine by the multinational mining giant Rio Tinto.

Dust from coal mines, he said, coats the roofs of people’s homes and runs into their rainwater tanks, polluting the community’s water supply. Day and night, noise is a constant issue.

Lamb also noted the impact of mining on land values in the area. The village of Camberwell in the Hunter Valley, for instance, which is surrounded by mines on three sides, only has four privately owned homes – the rest are occupied by miners or are derelict.

Yancoal, the owner of the Ashton mine – 14 km northwest of the town of Singleton in Hunter Valley – owns 87 percent of homes in the area.

Health risks for communities, ecosystem

Wendy Bowman, one of the last remaining residents of Camberwell village who has farmed in the Valley since 1957, is extremely concerned about the extent of mining in the area.

She lives on a farm at Rosedale, between the towns of Muswellbrook and Singleton, and she is refusing to leave the area. She left her previous farm when the dust and water pollution caused by the Ravensworth South open cut mine became impossible to live with.

In a video on the CAHA website, she says that she has dust in her lungs and that she has lost 20 percent of her lung capacity. But she is far more concerned about the health of the children in the area than she is about her own medical condition, and the consequences for the Department of Health in 20 or 30 years time.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), coal mining and coal combustion for electricity generation is associated with high emissions of sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxide, both of which react to form secondary particulate matter in the atmosphere.

Complex air pollutants such as these are known to increase the risk of chronic lung and respiratory disorders and disease, including lung cancer, and pose additional threats to children, and pregnant women.

CAHA states that most health and medical research on coal-related pollution focuses on fine particles measuring between 2.5 and 10 micrometres in diameter (PM 2.5-PM10), which are particularly damaging to human health.

According to the CAHA report, emissions of PM10 increased by 20 percent from 1992-2008 in the Sydney Greater Metropolitan area, an increase that is attributable to the increase in coal mining in the Hunter Valley.

The report states that while at one time the Hunter Valley was “renowned for its clean air”, in 2014 it was identified as an “air pollution hot spot”.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida