This Country Has Been Running Only on Renewable Energy
Costa Rica achieved something truly remarkable this summer, running its entire power grid on renewable energy alone.
The Central American country ran on green energy for 76 days straight, during a time period that began in June and ran through August.
That 76-day streak only accounts for half of Costa Rica's renewable energy use for the year, racking up at least 150 days of green energy off and on throughout 2016.
Last year, Costa Rica operated on renewable energy for a whopping 299 days.
ScienceAlert.com reports the country has pulled off the energy coup primarily by harnessing hydropower. And heavy rains over the last few years have helped fuel that tremendous water-powered energy production.
More than 80 percent of Costa Rica's energy generation was achieved through hydro. The rest came primarily through geothermal and wind energy.
And while that is a major accomplishment, Costa Rica has only been able to ditch fossil fuels for long periods of time because it has several things going for it.
First, it's a small country, only about half the size of Kentucky with a population of just 4.9 million people.
Second, Costa Rica uses less energy than other countries because its economy is based primarily on tourism and agriculture, not manufacturing.
For 2015, Costa Rica only needed about 10,713 gigawatt-hours of electricity.
By contrast, last year the United States generated about four million gigawatt-hours of electricity. The U.S. Energy Information Administration reports about 66 percent of that U.S. power was generated from coal and natural gas.
The U.S. also generated electricity in 2015 from nuclear and renewable sources.
Nuclear power accounted for 20 percent, hydropower generated 6 percent, and wind power generated nearly 5 percent of U.S. electricity.
