Uruguay’s Green Power REVOLUTION

With no fossil fuel reserves to rely on and domestic demand rising, the country had to get creative or go broke just trying to keep the lights on.

NATASHA HAKIMI ZAPATA

MUCH OF THE VAST LANDSCAPE OF URUguay remains true to its historical image—down to the lone gaucho roaming the pampas. But there have been some notable additions. Towering white wind turbines and glistening solar panels are now as much a part of the iconography of Uruguay as the grass itself, though they began to pop up across the country only in recent years, and seemingly all at once. Not exactly tourist attractions, they are the most visible evidence of a green energy transformation that continues to turn heads the world over: Despite having far fewer resources than the United States, Germany, and other wealthy nations that have been painfully slow to reduce their consumption of fossil fuels amid the deepening climate crisis—as of 2023, only 21.4 percent of the US…

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The Nation (Digital) - 1 Issue, April 2025

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