Electrek morning green energy brief: Costa Rica 98% renewable, global solar growth, solar cheaper than coal and more!

Costa Rica goes renewable for 98% in 2016 – I’ll write about the details and further pans on this soon, but thought it was impressive enough t give it top billing. Yes, Costa Rica is a small country blessed with hydroelectric dams – however – their lessons learned with advanced energy sources are starting to seep out to the rest of the world. Looking forward to telling the world 100% renewable for Costa Rica in 2017.

Bloomberg sees solar power becoming cheapest global source in less than 10 years – We know, on this website, that in the sunnier climates of the world solar is already the cheapest. This report thinks that for the whole of the planet – when all locations, sunny or not – the average price of solar will be lowest. The nay sayers are leaving the building.

Global market for solar power spreading to more counties – Mexico at 5.3GW, Spain at 3GW and India to increase by as much as 90%. These countries in combination with the big numbers coming from China, the USA and Japan might lead to the first 80GW year for solar power globally in 2017.

Bifacial solar panels from Yingli get certified – Anyone have bifacial panels installed? How do they perform? Hey manufacturers – got anything for me? Solid third party approved numbers? I’d love to do a write up on the energy production of your system or product. I really love the idea of this technology, but have no hard data to determine ROI numbers.

6.5 million dead per year from air pollution – While this is a six month old report, the advertisement below in a Beijing subway was recently put up. I’ve watched many movies in which one of the main plots was general society paying for something that was fundamentally ‘free.’ Clean air is something that society has historically thought should be free – in the United States the EPA has cleaned the smog that used to kill Americans in the 1950-1970s. China has that lesson to learn. 6.5 million people lose that battle every year.

Beijing's subway ads offer a glorious glimpse of our dystopian future. pic.twitter.com/amM5NZx8fU

— David Ramli (@Davidramli) January 2, 2017

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