Climate negotiators convened in Morocco, this month to discuss how to turn the Paris climate accord into action. The accord, signed by almost 200 countries last year, came into force on Nov. 4. Many questions persist about how each country can move toward the zero carbon-energy target that experts say is necessary to avoid destructive climate change. Some parts of the world are better positioned than others to take this test. Latin America is a good example.
The region faces some of the toughest obstacles to halting energy emissions, such as rapidly increasing car ownership. But many Latin American countries also have among the best opportunities to reach climate goals because of their extremely low-carbon electricity sectors.
There is growing evidence that the effects of climate change are already occurring. The last five years have been the hottest on record, according to the World Meteorological Organization. Ice melt and warming temperatures that expand seawater have accelerated the rate of sea-level rise around the world, putting hundreds of millions of people in low-lying areas at risk. Warming temperatures also bring an increase in the frequency, intensity and duration of extreme weather events like storms, droughts and heat waves. Global warming can destroy agriculture, housing and roads across much of the planet, endangering everything from food security to energy supply.
Most Latin American countries, including the two biggest emitters, Brazil and Mexico, have ratified the Paris agreement. However, only one signatory in the region, Costa Rica, made a pledge that would help meet the accord’s goal of keeping the rise in the planet’s average temperature below two degrees Celsius. according to analysis by the Climate Action Tracker.
To reduce per capita emissions consistent with this goal, by 2050 Latin America would not only have to stop deforestation and reduce emissions from agriculture and other non-energy sources, it would also have to cut consumers’ energy use by 40 percent through huge improvements in efficiency. The region would also need to “decarbonize” 90 percent of its power sector and electrify its entire transportation sector, according to a study by the Inter-American Development Bank. Decarbonization would require replacing high-carbon energy sources like oil and gas with zero carbon sources, like solar or wind energy.
Latin America is in many respects ahead of other regions in sustainable transport and clean energy. Nearly 80 percent of its population lives in cities, and demand for public transportation is second only to China’s. Latin America’s 69 bus rapid transit systems move 20 million people per day. Governments are looking to reduce emissions by improving fuel efficiency and expanding cleaner vehicles. But this is not enough. Emissions from transportation are rapidly growing in the region, as car ownership rises and oil consumption increases.
As middle-income economies, the region’s countries have among the highest growth rates of car ownership in the world. In lower-income countries, like many in Africa and South Asia, only a small portion of the population owns cars, while in high-income countries like the United States car ownership has already peaked.
In the power sector, Latin America’s per capita emissions are among the world’s lowest, as 48 percent of generation capacity comes from renewable energy sources, 96 percent of which is hydropower.
However, hydropower has become less reliable because of increasingly frequent droughts and social opposition to new projects. As a result, several countries are expanding natural-gas-fired power to provide a reliable source of baseload power. While this helps meet short-term emissions targets because natural gas is cleaner than coal or oil for power generation, these investments will encourage the use of fossil fuels for decades, making it more difficult to reach long-term goals.
Cutting energy emissions is increasingly important for reducing Latin America’s total carbon footprint. Historically, two-thirds of the region’s emissions have come from land-use changes and one-third have been energy-related — the reverse of the world average. But more recently, deforestation has fallen, especially in the Brazilian Amazon, and energy has emerged as one of the primary drivers of emissions growth in the region.
To meet the ambitious Paris agreement Latin American countries would have to build infrastructure that supports low-carbon energy systems. At the same time, they will need to increase hydropower generation to ensure more sources of baseload power and expand electrical grid integration, both domestically and regionally, to compensate for the intermittent nature of renewable energy.
Enormous investments must also be made in electric vehicles and public transportation. Consumers should be encouraged to adopt these cleaner options through incentives like tax breaks, congestion charges and preferential parking and driving lanes. Capacity for electricity generation will also need to expand substantially to accommodate increased electricity demand for transportation. The low cost of renewables in Latin America could help accelerate its transition to sustainable energy.
Many of the commitments that Latin American countries made under the Paris agreement include conditional pledges dependent on international finance and technology transfer. This month’s climate talks are expected to clarify access to such assistance.
The climate goals for the next decades will require major transformations in the way people consume energy as well as technological breakthroughs to find new energy uses and sources. In Latin America, countries will have to define their own paths, but they all need to start planning their long-term climate change strategies today.
Lisa Viscidi is the director of the Energy, Climate Change and Extractive Industries Program at the Inter-American Dialogue, where Rebecca O’Connor is a program assistant.