We are all aware that the climate is changing and that, if nothing is done about it, living conditions will deteriorate in the coming decades. The appeal for a change in habits, for more conscious consumerism and for the use of renewable energies has been reaching a wider audience, but there is still a lot to be done. Portugal was the first country to commit to achieving carbon neutrality by 2050, however, the question is: are we doing enough?
A recent UN report on sustainable development for 2019 suggests a relatively positive scenario. According to the UN, Portugal is ranked 26th on the list of the 162 most sustainable countries in the world, whereby, of the 17 criteria analysed, Portugal performs best in item seven, that of renewable energy. Comparing these numbers with those in relation to the production of energy in the country, published by REN (National Energy Grids), clean sources account for 45% of total consumption between January and September this year. Pollutant sources account for 44%, while the remaining 11% is attributed to imports.
“Portugal obtains almost half of its energy from renewable sources”, explained the specialist Ramez Naam recently in the SingularityU Portugal series “Inspiring the Future”, adding that “wind and solar energy is cheaper than coal and gas, and that is without any subsidies". According to Naam, this is good news for the country, as it can, through the government, create opportunities for the market to compete in the production of these types of energy, thereby reducing prices and increasing the use of the same. “People normally buy the cheapest energy”, he states, citing solar energy as an example, the price of which "has dropped 250 times".
The data published by REN, illustrated in the infograph below, shows that only 4.4% of the energy produced from renewable sources comes from photovoltaic panels. Maybe for this reason, Ramez Naam argues that "the bad news is that the transition from pollutant energy to clean energy is not occurring fast enough". Despite all this, the signs seem to suggest that Portugal is on the right path, although we need to continue to invest in the production of renewable energies and to amass a surplus of such energy as soon as possible.
