Hello and welcome back to Drilled. I'm Amy Westervelt.

Today we are bringing you the final drilling deep episode of the year, but don't worry,

we'll have more for you next year. In this recurring series, Adam Lewenstein talks to the authors of various books that have come out

that tackle the climate crisis, democracy, energy transition, techno-utopia, AI, all the things

that are sort of feeding into the polycrisis today. I'm obsessed with today's book, Natasha Hakimi Zapata's Another World is Possible, Lessons for

America from Around the Globe.

I love this book.

It brings us nine inspiring case studies from places that completely reject the quote unquote wisdom of the West

and have done things differently and had it work out. Shocker. A really great example is this

idea that of course everyone knows that it's naive to think that fossil fuels won't be around for decades

to come. Of course, we're going to need them. Everybody knows this. Blah, blah, blah. But more

than a decade ago, as Apata tells us, when wind and solar were actually way more expensive than

they are today, Uruguay, which had been dealing with droughts and energy shortages for a long time,

transitioned its entire economy to almost exclusively renewables.

Today, 98% of its electricity comes from renewable sources.

And they did that transition in just two years.

And they used the savings to slash the country's poverty rate from 40% into the single digits.

That transformation is just one of the nine stories that Zapata tells in this book.

I love ending on this note that the way things are is not the way they have to be.

I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. Forget the Africa you think you know.

This is Radio Workshop.

Real stories about young Africans.

...