Guatemala's renewables share in Dec kept alive by biomass

Sugar cane. Author: Jenny Mealing. License: Creative Commons, Attribution 2.0 Generic

Guatemala’s renewables were behind 73.34% of all electricity generated in December, slowing down after reaching a 77% share the month before, the latest figures presented by the National Electric Energy Commission (CNEE) have shown.

Hydropower, while still being the leading source of renewable energy, took the biggest hit in December. Its share in the total production plunged to 33.72%, after generating more than half of Guatemala’s power for two months.

The hole that hydro left was filled by a significant increase in bagasse cogeneration, helped by a higher share of coal and imports from Mexico.

As the sugarcane harvest season progressed through its second month, the share of biomass almost doubled in December.

Summary of Guatemala’s power mix in December is summarised in the table below:

Source:	Share in December:	Share in November:
Hydro	33.72%	51.86%
Bagasse biomass	31.56%	16.88%
Wind	4.06%	4.24%
Solar	1.70%	1.61%
Geothermal	2.26%	2.12%
Coal	21.62%	19.74%