https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/UY?wind=false&solar=fal... (ElectricityMaps: Uruguay)

Tangentially, Paraguay runs entirely on hydropower from the Itaipu dam, which also provides a substantial amount of power to Brazil.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Itaipu_Dam

(if you know someone at the org who runs the Itaipu dam [https://www.itaipu.gov.br/], please have them reach out to ElectricityMaps to get that generation data on the map; last time I checked, they just had a broken PHP page that stopped counting total lifetime generation [https://www.itaipu.gov.br/sites/default/files/dado_op/dadosi...])

Itaipu is mostly considered a brazillian infrastructure. Brazil paid for most of the construction, which is why they negotiated very good deals on the agreement with paraguay, which is the size of a brazillian municipality. They pay like $20 per Kw instead of the $400 the market would pay.

the deal is up now btw, so the media is covering paraguay attempt to renegotiate it.

> Paraguay, which is the size of a brazillian municipality.

That's understating that country's size a lot; it's the size of a Brazilian state, not a Brazilian municipality (even if you consider the huge municipalities in the Amazon region).

He's talking about population, not physical size.

There exists this page:

https://www.itaipu.gov.br/energia/geracao

But they don't seem to publish anything on the Brazilian data portal (that's bad), nor they seem to publish anything parseable on their site.

I also couldn't find any breakdown of the energy sold to each country. The Brazilian electric system operator (ONS) has the Brazilian numbers, but I don't know where to get the other ones.

> Tangentially, Paraguay runs entirely on hydropower from the Itaipu dam

Which is hardly incidental, having access to ungodly amounts of hydro power is the easiest way to run on 100% renewables. Iceland has similarly been 100% (or near enough) renewables for decades, despite more than 70% of its electricity going to aluminum smelters.

Norway similarly runs on 100% renewable electricity because it has enough hydro for pretty much all of it (Norway is the 213th country by population, but something like top 10 hydro producer)

I’d always lazily imagined Iceland’s renewable production to involve mainly their geothermal resources. I was surprised to learn that a phenomenal amount of hydro came online in a pretty quick period in the ‘00s [0].

A casual shufti suggests this was part of a broad policy push, but that it was mainly to do with a series of purpose-built hydro projects specifically to support Alcoa’s smelting facility. [1]

It smells like there’s a story of a few strong personalities with ambitious visions somewhere in the mix here. Would any of this crowd know where I might turn to find that story?

[0] https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-consumption-by-sou...

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kárahnjúkar_Hydropower_Plant... (with a fair bit of Wikipedian NIMBY-ish color commentary in the mix there)

The overall energy mix leans much more heavily on geothermal, but it’s used a lot for direct heating.

And Kárahnjúkar is not a case of the NIMBY, to an approximation there’s no one living in the highlands. It’s large scale environmental destruction for the benefits of a large company which the people of Iceland objected to.

Tasmania has long produced more than enough power from hydro.

A Paraguayan here. The above claim is not entirely true.

Paraguay has access to Itaipú hydropower, and it certainly powers most of the energy grid, but not all.

There's also the Yacyretá dam, which is jointly held with Argentina, downstream from the Itaipú site on the same Paraná river. It generates quite significant amounts of electricity and Paraguay also uses some of it to power its grid.

And there's also the Acaray dam, which is wholly owned by Paraguay, in operation since 1973.

There's also a dam on the Yguazú river (not the same river than the one with the falls) which is not machinized but otherwise ready to enter production once it's equipped with turbines.

Some isolated locations on the Chaco (northern area) also run on solar power and some also on timber/wood-based plants, but these are rapidly being obsoleted by power lines coming from Itaipú.

With that provision aside, it could be said that Paraguay has been getting its electrity from wholly renewable sources since at least 1983.

Thank you for correcting me! Most of my information is from the Wikipedia page I referenced, so this is helpful context to be able to reference in the future.

> there's no reason to try and prove this wrong

Well, there is one reason: If Uruguay can do it, then it clearly demonstrates how blitheringly incompetent Western leaders are.

It shows how horrifically pointless our oil wars have been (outside of making the instigators even wealthier), and nullifies each and every bullshit argument of the fossil fuel industry completely.

Some numbers: Uruguay has $20k GDP per capita, compared to the US' $76k - basically a quarter of the wealth.

Hydro power… it’s like 50% of their power. Then wind, then biomass, then solar.

China has deployed more wind power this year than the UK's total aggregate generation capacity, and double US total aggregate solar generation. Yes, South America has a substantial amount of existing hydro power, but this is no excuse for developed world laggards. It is a choice to prioritize oil, gas, and other fossil fuel subsidies and infra support, but it is hopeless with global EV and renewables manufacturing flywheels coming up to speed (China is selling ~1 million EVs per month as of 2023Q4, solar PV manufacturing will reach 1TW next year). Just as Tesla (and BYD in China, credit where credit due) was the underdog and "David" until they rocketed passed legacy auto and became "Goliath", the same will happen to clean energy vs fossil tech. Like a recession, you're not going to be able to call it until looking back at trailing indicators.

https://www.iea.org/reports/renewable-energy-market-update-j...

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/nov/13/chinas-carb...

> The most striking growth has been in solar power, according to Myllyvirta. Solar installations increased by 210 gigawatts (GW) this year alone, which is twice the total solar capacity of the US and four times what China added in 2020.

> The analysis, which is based on official figures and commercial data, found that China installed 70GW of wind power this year – more than the entire power generation capacity of the UK. It is also expected to add 7GW of hydro power and 3GW of nuclear power capacity this year, said the report.

https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-chinas-emissions-set-to...

> China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions are set to fall in 2024 and could be facing structural decline, due to record growth in the installation of new low-carbon energy sources.

(my note: pedal to the floor, no one ever said "we have too much clean energy!")

When you have the benefit of being able to move millions of people by force to build a dam, and get to produce solar panels with slave labor, it's way easier.

Those are very bad things, no doubt whatsoever, but the data shows it is unnecessary for success. US solar and battery/storage manufacturing is exploding due to Inflation Reduction Act incentives, for example. Those bad things are not an excuse to not push scaling harder faster. Automation is a substantial component of solar and battery manufacturing, and you can build that automation with willing labor earning fair compensation.

https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2023/08/14/over-155-gw-of-u-s-so...

https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/news-insights...

https://www.utilitydive.com/spons/ira-sets-the-stage-for-us-...

1 in 6 American workers stay in unwanted jobs just to keep their healthcare [0]. Is that so different? Americans will tell you with a straight face that giving people free college will affect the numbers joining the military - is that so different?

Also, seems to me that the 8 trillion, with a t, dollars that were spent creating terror in the middle east would have bought a few panels. To compare directly, the highest estimate for transitioning the US to 100% renewable electricity is 5.7 trillion dollars [1].

So, if we'd just killed about 600,000 fewer civilians we could afford the change. Pointing fingers at China is easier than accepting our own actions, but you know, there's a lot to be said for taking responsibility for what one can actually change.

0 - https://news.gallup.com/poll/349094/workers-stay-unwanted-jo...

1 - https://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/renewable/cost-of...

You first point: that's not even close to being enslaved or forced to do whatever your government tells you to do under threat of imprisonment. Yes, it is very, very different.

You can't use multiple accounts like this, so I've banned both of these. Please don't create accounts to break HN's rules with.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

It's pretty concerning that there are users on this platform operating like this given what it could imply.

You first point: that's not even close to being enslaved or forced to do whatever your government tells you to do under threat of imprisonment. Yes, it is very, very different.

In a country where thousands of people break the law just so they can get food and a little healthcare in prison - no, it's really not.

Why are there two replies to you with the same content but two user names?

Yea but like parts of the PNW are >50% hydro too (Seattle is >80%), but they still haven't ever closed the gap to 100% for any significant length of time.

BC Hydro (British Columbia electric power utility, government owned) was 98% renewable sources in 2022, ~91% of that hydro[1] - for the entire province.

that last 2% is going to take a lot of work to replace, but I'd be surprised to see it backslide.

[1] https://www.bchydro.com/content/dam/BCHydro/customer-portal/...

Seattle City Light, according to a 2016 report (and its definitely improved since), was 88% Hydro, 5% nuclear, and 4% wind.

https://app.electricitymaps.com/map reports Seattle City Light as 100% hydro, fwiw.

When you have 50% of your electricity made using hydro-power, it's really easy to integrate as much renewable energy as you'd like. This is not even the best story, there are countries with close to 100% clean electricity, like Norway or Austria. It just doesn't scale that well for large countries where hydro can't amount to more than 10-20%.

There's no reason to speculate, much less pronounce the transition impossible. Smart people have down the math.

Transitioning the US to 100% clean power would cost - at most - $5.7 trillion.

We spent $8 trillion fucking up the middle east for oil.

Think about that - take all the time you need. Because if you still think this is about hydro access, and not leadership, you're holding up the change that is necessary.

I'd like to see some specifics in where you get the $5.7 trillion.

More specifically how was the problem of intermittent power solved? I'm not aware of any grid-scale solution to this problem unless you include vast amounts of hydro to provide power when there is no wind or no sun or both.

> Because if you still think this is about hydro access, and not leadership

I looked up the McKenzie report[1] where I think the 5.7 trillion comes from. In short, the renewable energy would be 1.5 trillion, and batteries 2.5 trillion (transmission is the rest). If you have 50% hydro, then you don't need batteries, so the cost for the US would drop by 2.5trillion. Having hydro is a big reason why some countries can do it easier than others. It's not a white and black situation, after-all, the US is already investing a lot in renewable energy.

Second, the report says it provisioned for 900 "gigawatts" of batteries. If they mean GW rather than GWh (Which I think they do), that is not nearly enough, that is just 2000 GWh at today's prices. The US needs 500GWh on average each hour, so you only get batteries for 4 hours. You need to either build much more PV, or buy many more batteries. Also, 2000GWh is about 2 years worth of current global battery manufacturing. It's just not the same building out a small country or a large country electrical grid.

https://e360.yale.edu/digest/shifting-u-s-to-100-percent-ren...

That being said, it will happen, we'll soon switch to PV production, and it will happen faster than people think. It will be a disruption previously only seen in software. By 2030 we'll probably be pretty much powered by PV panels.

South Australia has sourced 71.5% of its electricity from wind and solar over the last 12 months. It was 86.9% in October of this year. And its main transmission company is forecasting it will be 100% by 2026/27 [1]

To be absolutely clear, the percentages above are wind and solar only. They don't include hydro of which SA has only one small generator (3MW), that is situated in the main city's gravity-fed supply pipes. [2]

[1] https://reneweconomy.com.au/wind-and-solar-meet-stunning-87-...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terminal_Storage_Mini_Hydro

It's relatively easy to generate that amount, especially when you can easily import 20% of your power(very dirty coal power), and also run gas turbines for another 40%, like it is at this very moment https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/AU-SA

When you're talking about changing the US, it couldn't just import 100GW, Canada and Mexico couldn't provide that much, even if they were clean energy. There is just a difference between providing for one small region vs a continent. Also, Uruguay has huge neighbors, they could easily import-export clean energy from them (they are all hydro-centric).

But yeah, I will see the US going to 70% pretty soon, considering where panel prices are. The one big thing missing is the low cost to install on rooftops. In the US is costs at least 3 dollars per watt to install panels, whereas in the Eu or Australia it's under 1 dollar. The panels themselves can be bought for 15-20 *cents* per watt, so there is a lot of room for improvement. Rooftop solar in the US is a big scam at the moment, they are fleecing the consumers. On the other hand, utility size in the US is cheap, so they will cover the gap.

Your link shows that AU-SA only used 12% gas in october, and no coal at all.

I am talking for hours when there isn't much renewables. If you set the timeline to 24 hours and look at the hours, you have periods with 55% gas and also 20% imports. You can assume imports are dirty coal, because that is most of Australia.

I've seen others point out that it's the average that matters for emissions and that was what the other commenter was posting. That makes sense to me, the peak usage only matters for cost reasons, and apparently gas turbines are really cheap.

Agreed. What Uruguay is doing is interesting and worthy of further study. The linked podcast with transcript linked below goes into more detail about how long it took to build up the program, private/public partnerships, how expected consumer savings are partly negated by expanded usage. There are a lot of moving pieces.

In 2008 Ramón Méndez Galain, a particle physicist with no experience in government, was appointed Director of Energy for Uruguay and proceeded to reimagine the country’s electricity grid. In less than a decade, Méndez’s energy transition plan succeeded in freeing the country’s power sector from its growing reliance on imported oil, and achieved energy independence through a diverse electricity mix, approaching 100% renewables.

https://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/podcast/how-uruguay-went-al...

He also did a TED talk.

https://www.ted.com/talks/ramon_mendez_galain_this_country_r... ("TED: This country runs on 98 percent renewable electricity")

If Uruguay can run on 100% renewable energy, the unstated implication is "The US could do it too, we just lack the political will". (As opposed to the idea that "Renewable energy is a genuinely hard problem that will take time, effort, and technological advances to solve.") The implication that "we just lack the political will" can feel like a criticism of anyone who's not maximally-environmentalist. I think that's why people are getting defensive about it.

At no point in the article is that claim made.

Everything you just said may be true, but it’s also true that the US does lack the political will.

It's impossible to solve difficult problems without the will to do so.

The will do to do so is frequently more easily accessed when the problems are recognized as more tractable than previously thought.

I think the problem is that the headline claims they are "Energy Independent", but when you drill down, it's only electricity that is being affected. Energy independence usually refers to other kinds of energy as well, including petroleum powered vehicles.

Well and of course people love to hate on renewables.

Will this be 12 months in a year? Or are they returning to power generation via petroleum?

That's fair, but electrification is the stated goal of all of the world. The article states they reduced their production costs by half, and although I didn't see actual numbers I tend to believe it. So it looks to me that Uruguay has people in charge that get it, and also now have results. There is no going back for them and they'll make progress very fast. People underestimate the long term effect of cheap renewables - you invest in them and save money long term, which you again invest in renewables. It's basically like compound interest.

Uruguayan here.

Point 1 is wrong. The average Uruguayan house doesn't have the means to heat using wood.

I think we can do it because we have a small population, almost no industry, and neither summers nor winters get to extreme temperatures.

45% percent of households use wood as the main source of heating, electricity is 24%. https://www.ambito.com/uruguay/con-el-precio-la-lena-aumento...

And obviously this reduces the consumption of electricity, making it easier to cover the electricity needed with renewables.

Doesn't take anything away from it, it's still great that this is happening.

How does wood compare to gas/coal/etc? I always hear that biofuels are not great compared to other renewables, is wood somehow different? Doesn't it make lots of particulate if you don't have a high end modern stove?

That doesn't make it any less impressive. If a small industrial base can builds its own renewable infrastructure, then a larger, proportionally richer base should have less trouble doing it.

In terms of ease and industrial base required it seems to me much will come down to how much of the renewable generation is hydro (and how much is possible given an area's hydrology) since that is so much 'easier' than modern renewables. That's largely orthogonal to wealth/population/industrial capacity. Although I suppose greater industrialisation and wealth would increase energy demand per capita. In the US it is 6%. For Uruguay electricity is 37% hydro. It is still impressive though.

I reckon biomass is 'easy' as well but it is only so scalable.

Neither is very sexy because of hydro's environmental issues (and in some cases water supply inefficiency), and biomass burning being... biomass burning.

The US has a lot of nuclear which I would call "renewable enough," and that's not very sexy either.

> nobody wants to believe the headline/article

Look at the headline—

"'Energy independent' Uruguay runs on 100% renewables for four straight months"

and the article's very first sentence—

"Renewables alone have powered the Uruguayan economy for nearly four straight months."

versus the quote you use (the second sentence of the article)—

"In the three months to end-September 2023, the South American nation generated all of its electricity from renewable sources"

Both the headline and the first sentence are misleading. The writer did this on purpose. My guess is it's because he (Nick Hedley) likely knows that many (most?) people reading the headline won't go past that first sentence and will come away with a false sense of what really happened. Couldn't he have instead spread the good news with "Energy independent Uruguay runs its electrical grid on 100% renewables for four straight months"?

How is asking for upfront honesty being an acerbic pedant?

Proving OP's point in 3....2....1....

It appears I have to explain myself better.

You've heard the phrase "read the room"? The OP added this article to HN, a site known for its detail-oriented minds (programmers, engineers, technicians, etc.) or, if you prefer another insult, "rules lawyers".

And then someone complains that these same detail-oriented folks find that some of the details in the article are lacking? And tries shaming them into giving up their detail-oriented ways?

Odd flex.

The issue is some people are quick to dismiss progress especially on technologies with political salience.

> a site known for its detail-oriented minds

a site known for a commentariat that is, in aggregate, frequently wrong about details, particularly details that matter.

yes, it's great when people who really know what they are writing about show up here. But the great unwashed masses in the comment threads, for all of their fabled "detail-oriented minds" appear wrong at least as often as they are right.

"On the internet nobody knows you're an HN commenter with 3 years of JS experience".

Oh we know. We know. Man I miss n-gate.

I hadn't looked in a while. Sad that it ran out of steam

It's a clickbaity headline. That's it.

[delayed]

And,

> In just five years, $6 billion was invested in renewable energy — the equivalent of 12% of Uruguay’s GDP.

Any country that invests 12% of its GDP in something over five years is probably going to produce some impressive results!

> 3. Germany tried this and failed

Absolute nonsense. So far Germany never attempted to run 100% renewable for four months straight. To learn about the German government’s energy plans see for example here: https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/en/topics/climate-energy/clim... And here are the actual figures: https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/en/topics/climate-energy/rene... And here is a detailed report about the situation in 2021 (pdf): https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/sites/default/files/medien/47...