::: spoiler with this one weird trick
investing in infrastructure
:::
16
Frogmanfromlake [none/use name] - 9hr
Of course Uruguay. One of the few decent settler-colonial states
13
MarmiteLover123 [comrade/them, any] - 8hr
It's also got a total population smaller than a lot of large cities, just over 3 million, and not much industry (where most energy is used). "Easy" to have almost 100% renewable energy in that case. Still very impressive.
8
WrongOnTheInternet [none/use name] - 7hr
Uruguay is around the global average for electricity consumption per capita, about 10kwh a day.
Hydro is obviously very helpful but transition to a renewable grid is basically straightforward for most countries, noting the real challenges in diverting fossil fuel energy use to renewable electricity use
7
MarmiteLover123 [comrade/them, any] - 7hr
A renewable grid (excluding nuclear and hydro) is definitely not a straight forward engineering problem because energy sources such as wind and solar are intermittent. That requires the grid to be backfilled by a non intermittent source of energy, and/or storage of energy from intermittent sources (using for instance a lot of batteries.) That storage can get complicated at scale, especially with inverters feeding directly into the grid. (Batteries are DC, the grid is AC). Lots of complex mathematics to prevent surges and brownouts. Nuclear + renewables would be a great solution but almost no one wants to build nuclear power plants.
yogthos in news
This physics professor transformed his country to 98% renewable energy in five years
https://boingboing.net/2025/12/09/this-physics-professor-transformed-his-country-to-98-renewable-energy-in-five-years.html::: spoiler with this one weird trick investing in infrastructure :::
Of course Uruguay. One of the few decent settler-colonial states
It's also got a total population smaller than a lot of large cities, just over 3 million, and not much industry (where most energy is used). "Easy" to have almost 100% renewable energy in that case. Still very impressive.
Uruguay is around the global average for electricity consumption per capita, about 10kwh a day.
Hydro is obviously very helpful but transition to a renewable grid is basically straightforward for most countries, noting the real challenges in diverting fossil fuel energy use to renewable electricity use
A renewable grid (excluding nuclear and hydro) is definitely not a straight forward engineering problem because energy sources such as wind and solar are intermittent. That requires the grid to be backfilled by a non intermittent source of energy, and/or storage of energy from intermittent sources (using for instance a lot of batteries.) That storage can get complicated at scale, especially with inverters feeding directly into the grid. (Batteries are DC, the grid is AC). Lots of complex mathematics to prevent surges and brownouts. Nuclear + renewables would be a great solution but almost no one wants to build nuclear power plants.
I fucking Love Science