Discussion
Seven countries now generate 100% of their electricity from renewable energy
saidnooneever: i love that in a lot of countries people think these other countries are in the sticks and that they are modern... (ofc depending who u talk to but im sure we all know such a person...) :) a lot of perceptions based on old world views. Love to see these countries do so well on it. There might be many problems to solve still but it provides a degree of self reliance for energy that is really important today for a country i'd think
Mordisquitos: Specifically Albania, Bhutan, Nepal, Paraguay, Iceland, Ethiopia and the Democratic Republic of Congo.Not to downplay the positive steps that are being taken towards using renewable energy worldwide, but one must point out that all those countries except one are almost exclusively using hydroelectric power, whose availability at such scale is a geographical lottery. As for Iceland, which also relies mostly on hydroelectric power but not in such great a proportion, it makes up for it thanks to easy and abundant availability geothermal power (which, though environmentally friendly, is arguably not technically renewable).
darkwater: Why geothermal is not renewable? Earth is not going to cool its magma soon enough
paulnpace: Industrialized civilization is not going to survive on renewables. Every country achieving this goal will be a slave to whatever countries make stuff besides hand-made quilts.
locallost: The only slaves right now are people praying Iran and the US make a deal to open Hormuz.
gus_massa: Geothermal is powered by fission Uranium and other heavy atoms deep in the Earth.Solar is powered by fusion of Hydrogen in the Sun.I'd use the same classification for both.
left-struck: “Technically”
ahhhhnoooo: Then solar and wind aren't technically renewable either, because the sun is going to eventually consume the earth and explode.Geothermal is renewable.
leonidasrup: The Earth's heat content is about 1×10^19 TJ. This heat naturally flows to the surface by conduction at a rate of 44.2 TW and is replenished by radioactive decay at a rate of 30 TW. These power rates are more than double humanity's current energy consumption from primary sources, but most of this power is too diffuse (approximately 0.1 W/m^2 on average) to be recoverable.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geothermal_power#Resources
mr_mitm: Then no power source is "technically" renewable.
Mordisquitos: However much solar or wind energy we use, the Sun will last exactly as long. This is not a matter of scale. Even if we were to build a photovoltaic Dyson sphere around the Sun, it would have the same lifespan.That is not the case for geothermal. It could in theory be cooled down if exploited at a massive scale.Saying geothermal is not renewable is not an indictment nor a criticism. Geothermal is great and we should use it more. It's just technically not renewable, but that doesn't matter.
IneffablePigeon: Well yes, hydro and geothermal are the easiest (and earliest perfected) renewable sources to provide consistent base load. It would be odd if the first countries to achieve fully renewable power weren’t making use of those technologies.Other countries will have to be more reliant on interconnects, diverse renewable mixes and batteries. Luckily this is now almost always cheaper and more secure than fossil fuels and the trend lines point towards that continuing to be more and more true over time.
readthenotes1: Those "countries in the sticks", one report says that the DRC only has at most 20% of the households on electricity. This report says only 10% https://www.trade.gov/country-commercial-guides/democratic-r...On the other hand, balcony solar power will be a game changer for the world, provided your neighbors won't steal the panels like they do the catalytic converters in my neighborhood.
Mordisquitos: No, not quite. Geothermal is powered by the accumulated heat stored in rocks from fission Uranium and other heavy atoms deep in the Earth (and other phenomena).Geothermal hotspots do not reheat by fission or otherwise at the same speed that we extract their energy (if they did we'd be in trouble if we weren't extracting it!).As I mentioned in another comment, build a Dyson sphere of solar panels around the Sun and it will last just as long. Build an all-Earth geothermal plant and the heat will be depleted.
realo: Perovskite Tandem are the best , according to the graph.Why is it that those are reserved for ultra-big utility companies and I cannot buy those for my home or even my balcony?
patall: By that definition, hydroelectric dams are not a renewable energy source for most of the year.
philipkglass: At present, those tandem cells are still experimental. Nobody is manufacturing them on gigawatt scale like for other solar cell technologies.
mpweiher: Albania: 90% Hydropower, $12150 GDP/personBhutan: 99% Hydropower, $ 4700 GDP/personNepal: 23% Imported $ 1381 GDP/person rest Hydropower (2/3 of energy: firewood etc.) Paraguay: 100% Hydropower, $ 7990 GDP/personIceland: 99% Hydry/Geo, $90000 GDP/personEthiopia: 88% Hydropower, $ 1350 GDP/personDR Kongo: 98% Hydropower, $ 760 GDP/person , 13% of country has electricityNot sure how this is applicable (and in many cases: desirable) for countries that do not have significant hydropower potential or maybe want a GDP greater than $760 per person per year.
phtrivier: > Albania, Bhutan, Nepal, Paraguay, Iceland, Ethiopia and the Democratic Republic of Congo produced more than 99.7 per cent of the electricity they consumed using geothermal, hydro, solar or wind power.Let's head to electricitymaps.com !Albania (https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/AL/live/fifteen_min...)- On 2026-04-12 16:45 GMT+2, 22,67% of electricity consumed by Albania is imported from Greece, which generates 22% of its electricity from gas. Interestingly, Albania exports about as much to Montenegro as it imports from Greece.Bhutan:- 100% hydro, makes perfect senseNepal:- 98% hydro, a bit of solar for good measureIceland:- 70% hydro, 30% geoParaguay:- 99,9% hydroEthiopia:- 96,4% hydroDRC- 99.6% hydroSo, the lessons for all other countries in the world is pretty clear: grow yourselves some mountains, dig yourselves a big river, and dam, baby, dam !!(I'm kidding, but I'm sure someone has a pie-in-the-sky geoengineering startup about to disrupt topography using either AI, blockchain, or both.)
jacquesm: And have either a small population or a very low per-person energy budget.But: 7 isn't the number that matters, what matters is that next year it will be 8 or 9. That would be worth documenting.
surgical_fire: Well, when geothermal stops being renewable there will be no humans around to need energy generation.You are still technically correct, which is the best kind of correct.But if we follow that rationale, in a long enough timeline, solar and wind is also not renewable.
realo: Well... if you go to the web site , they seem to welcome very large orders. Just not mine or yours.Might be experimental and unavailable, but just for small orders? Come on ...
nine_k: Also, many of these countries are tropical or subtropical, with optimal conditions for solar energy year round. Nepal and Bhutan are relatively far from equator, but have many days of unobstructed sunshine.
secondcoming: How long would it take for the heat to be depleted? Humans have only managed to drill something like 12km into the earth because it gets too hot to go further.
ilitirit: Probably at least slightly misleading, just reading the names of some of the countries in the list (I am from South Africa).Just because a country generates 100% of its energy from renewables, it doesn't mean that its enough to power the entire or even majority of the country. Case in point: DRC. I believe only half of the population has access to electricity. It's been a while since I've looked into continental stats, but a quick Google search suggests the situation hasn't changed that much in the last few years.
input_sh: I guess somewhat of a fun fact: Albania has rented(!) two floating(!) oil-powered power plants near the city of Vlöre that are there in case of emergency. The last time they were really needed was in 2022 (if I remember correctly), but these days they're not turned on any more than they need to be to make sure they're operating properly. That very expensive backup system is basically the only non-renewable source in the whole country, and most of the time it's just sitting there doing nothing.Being powered almost entirely by hydro means that the system is highly susceptible to droughts, so then they either have to spin up those oil plants from time to time or import electricity from abroad. I think it's also worth pointing out that nothing really changed because of climate change, the decision to rely on hydro was made in the 90s. The country used to have its own oil power plant that it heavily relied on before that decision, which slowly produced less and less until it was shut down for good in 2007. Some images of it from 2019: https://www.oneman-onemap.com/en/2019/06/26/the-abandoned-po...
Noaidi: Anyone on hacker news talking about technology from the United States should be humiliated and embarrassed by the situation. What good is technology without morality? The United States are so far behind and it’s not the fault of the politicians, it’s the fault of the scientist who are not focused on the single most important issue, climate change.
KellyCriterion: wasnt New Zealand also already far up beyond 90% renewable electricity a couple of years ago?
WarmWash: I'm wondering how this picture holds up if we include cooking and water heating.
