Costa Rica is one of the top five of countries in the world leading the way in renewable resources. It may be tiny, but it has a significant impact environmentally. Since 2014 the country’s energy has come from 99% renewable sources and running on a hundred percent renewable energy for more than two months twice in the last two years. Then, since June 2017 they've been set on eradicating single-use plastic by 2021-The first country in the world to do so. Now, in the summer of 2018, the state announced their aims to be completely carbon-neutral by the year 2021 – To be the first entirely carbon-free country in the world. Pretty impressive!
With its rich biodiversity, Costa Rica has also demonstrated far-sighted environmental leadership by pursuing reforestation, designating a third of the country as protected natural reserves, and deriving almost all of its electricity from clean hydropower.
Since the 1980s the government realized that nature is Costa Rica’s primary asset and therefore has made every effort to protect it: including, among others, reforestation, zoo closures, and establishing protected areas (25 percent of the total surface area of the country).
“A farmer stands near a wind mill of the National Power and Light Company in Santa Ana, Costa Rica, on Oct. 23, 2015.” (Ezequiel Becerra/AFP)
Over the past four years, Costa Rica has generated all but one percent of its electricity from renewable sources using its rivers, wind, volcanoes, and solar power. The hydroelectric plant on the Reventazón River, on the Caribbean slope, began operations in 2016 and it's the largest plant of its kind in Central America. Apart from that, they've installed seven wind turbine plants, six hydroelectric plants, and one solar plant. A statement from ICE indicated that three-quarters of renewable energy came from hydroelectric plants using river water; the rest was geothermal and wind power; followed by biomass, then solar power constituting the smallest percentage.
Solar panels, including this one in Guanacaste, Costa Rica, produce a small portion of the renewable energy (Joe Raedle/Getty)
On World Environment Day in 2017, the country announced its new national plan to eradicate all single-use plastics by 2021. From this moment on, plastic has to be replaced by alternatives that are a hundred percent recyclable or biodegradable and not petroleum-based. The country has the technical and financial support of the United Nations Development Program to help them achieve this.
Earlier that year, Carlos Alvarado Quesada was elected as Costa Rica's new president and his first act in office was to take a giant step forward in reducing carbonization. During his inauguration as a world leader, he announced his initiative to ban fossil fuels and become the world's first decarbonized society.
The forward-thinking small country of Costa Rica has made a great impression in environmentalism. But it's also conscious of the well-being of its citizens. It's part of the Wellbeing Economies Alliance—a coalition that also includes Scotland, New Zealand, and Slovenia—which, according to a recent column by economist Joseph Stiglitz, rather than emphasizing countries' GDP, "seeks to ensure that public policy advances citizens' wellbeing in the broadest sense, by promoting democracy, sustainability, and inclusive growth".
In the video interview below Democracy Now! speaks with Mónica Araya, a Costa Rican climate activist who works with the president of Costa Rica on sustainability issues. A highly recommended watch:
Costa Rica has also demonstrated far-sighted environmental leadership by pursuing reforestation, designating a third of the country as protected natural reserves, and deriving almost all of its electricity from clean hydropower. Marketing-Cloud-Email-Specialist exam dumps
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