Uruguay leads the Latin American energy transition and Sweden the world energy transition

Uruguay repeats this year as the Latin American country with the best energy transition to renewable sources, occupying an outstanding thirteenth position in the global index prepared by the World Economic Forum and the consulting firm Accenture, published today and led by Sweden.

The South American country dropped two places with respect to the 2020 ranking, although it remained in a very prominent place in the world and in the region, as Costa Rica ranked 26th (up one step with respect to last year) and Colombia, after dropping four places, was placed 29th.

They are followed by Brazil (in 30th position), Chile (34th), Paraguay (36th), Peru (42nd), Mexico (46th), Argentina (47th), Ecuador (48th) and Panama (50th), while the rest of the countries in the region occupy positions at the bottom of the table of 115 countries.

Venezuela, in 111th place, is one of the worst-ranked countries in the global energy transition, ahead of only Lebanon, Mongolia, Haiti and Zimbabwe.

The index, now in its tenth edition, shows that 92 countries have made progress in their transition to clean energy in the last decade, although only 13 of them have made a "steady" improvement, says the World Economic Forum, organizer of the annual meeting of leaders in Davos.

Norway (fifth last year) ranks second this year, and Denmark moves up one place to third, followed by Switzerland, Austria and Finland.

Among the world's leading economies, the United Kingdom ranks seventh and France ninth, while behind Uruguay are Germany (18th), the United States (24th) and Italy (27th), with China still in the bottom half of the table (68th) but up ten places from 2020.

Another emerging giant, India (which together with China consumes a third of global energy) falls 13 places this year to 87th.

According to the authors of the report, the transition "requires a complete transformation of the global energy, economic and social system that must begin now, as the next decade is crucial to achieving climate goals."

In this regard, the report recalls that eight of the 10 largest world economies have set a goal of net zero emissions by mid-century, and that last year investment in energy transition exceeded 500 billion dollars worldwide, despite the difficulties posed by the pandemic.

In ten years, the number of people on the planet without access to electricity has been reduced from 1.2 billion to 800 million, while the development of renewable energies has made it possible to increase environmental sustainability and energy security in importing countries, the study stresses.

On the negative side, the report notes that carbon intensity (greenhouse gas emissions per unit of GDP) has increased in emerging countries in Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa over the last decade.

Source: EFE