By Kyle Castellanos
It is no secret that environmental sustainability has been a mainstay in the 21st century’s global discourse. The international community has done an incredible job establishing a legitimate platform for dialogue and cooperation, evidenced by the development of the Paris Agreement in 2016 which established a framework for mitigating the effects of greenhouse emissions. Global powerhouses such as the United States, Germany, and China have made meaningful strides in instilling a sense of environmental consciousness through domestic policy campaigns. However, developing countries are having a much more difficult time attempting to do so.
Developing countries face a flurry of domestic burdens before they can begin to prioritize environmental sustainability. They must address problems of inequality, both social and economic, before passing legislation regarding clean energy and waste prevention. Typically, such countries turn to cheap fossil fuels, primarily coal, to power growing industries and bridge the gap of inequality, further exacerbating the climate issue.
Using coal to jumpstart economies is championed by China and India, who successfully used coal to vitalize their industrial sector and surge to economic stardom. The World Bank has also been criticized for favoring the financing of fossil fuel infrastructure in developing countries as an avenue for economic growth. Using cheap and environmentally destructive fossil fuels has seemingly become accepted as a necessary step in the development of growing economies.
Peru hopes to break this stereotype, emphasizing its efforts to implement successful clean energy programs early in 2020. After expanding its wind and solar farms, the Peruvian energy ministry reported an increased output of non-hydro renewable energy in January, up by 2 percent year-on-year. While not a drastic move away from fossil fuels, Peru’s non-hydro energy yields help reduce the country’s dependence on energy generated from natural gas, biogas, and cogeneration with steam. Peru’s case indicates a break away from developing countries’ traditional use of fossil fuels to power through the difficult process of achieving national development, which seems to be indicative of a growing sense of environmental consciousness in Latin America.
In late 2019, Columbia and nine other countries presented to the United Nations Climate Summit their collective target to achieve 70 percent clean energy usage by 2030. This is the most ambitious collective climate action goal, more than double the 32 percent target set by the European Union. Currently, the 70 percent clean energy target has the support of Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Paraguay, and Peru, all of which are categorized as developing countries. Hopefully this trend is indicative of a shift away from the use of fossil fuels and a growing sense of environmental consciousness.