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Costa Rica leads renewable energy production in Central America

Xinhua, August 21, 2016 Adjust font size:

Costa Rica had the highest renewable energy production in 2015 among the Central American countries, according to data from the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC).

ECLAC studied the 2015 energy production numbers for countries that are part of the Central American Integration System (SICA) and established that during this time period, Costa Rica produced 54 percent of its electricity through renewable sources.

Costa Rica produced 31 percent of Central America's clean energy in 2015, while Guatemala and Panama generated 20 and 19 percent, respectively.

At the same time, Honduras produced 11 percent, El Salvador nine percent, Nicaragua six percent, the Dominican Republic generated three percent and Belize produced one percent.

Central America generated a total of 64,075.9 gigawatt hours (GWh) in 2015 with 34,629.3 coming from renewable sources and 29,446.6 coming from contaminating sources.

Luis Pacheco, manager of electricity at the Costa Rican Electricity Institute (ICE), highlighted on Friday that Costa Rica's energy production reflects the efforts carried out by the government-owned company to generate and keep the energy matrix as clean as possible, with figures that are close to 100 percent of renewable production.

Pacheco also noted that the Institute is working on new projects to strengthen renewable production in order to consolidate Costa Rica's clean energy matrix.

"In the years to come we will integrate three geothermal plants and we will increase solar and wind participation which will consolidate our energy quality," Pacheco said.

The data from ECLAC also showed that Costa Rica and Belize were the Central American countries that contaminated the least when it came to producing electricity, given that they used figures close to zero percent of contaminating resources to produce their energy.

The SICA countries that generated the highest quantify of electricity from non-renewable sources were the Dominica Republic, 47 percent; Honduras, 16 percent; Panama, 11 percent; and Guatemala, 11 percent. Endit