(Bloomberg) -- Costa Rica is aiming for “strong progress” by the end of the decade in electrifying transportation to help “dramatically reduce” the nation's carbon footprint, according to President Carlos Alvarado.
The Central American nation's government has adopted a plan to cut net carbon emissions to zero by 2050. Yet despite tax incentives for electric cars and a series of small biofuel pilot projects, the country's transportation sector remains almost exclusively reliant on fossil fuel-powered vehicles.
“Our great opportunity is to electrify our transportation,” Alvarado said Wednesday in an interview with Bloomberg Television.
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“We are not only targeting private vehicles but also public transportation to make it cleaner and more efficient,” he said, citing a project to connect the country's cities via an electric train.
Costa Rica has the third-highest rate of car ownership in Latin America, behind Argentina and Mexico, and it's growing rapidly. Currently, less than 1% of the vehicle fleet is electric.
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