CMI: Efficient Vehicles part 1

Article 8 in a series that looks Princeton's Carbon Mitigation Initiative, which has proposed 15 carbon reduction strategies, in 4 broad categories, each of which could be scaled up to provide 1/7th the CO2 reduction necessary to stabilize the atmosphere.

Category 1: Efficiency and Conservation

Efficient Vehicles

One full wedge could be achieved if by 2054 we increase the fuel economy for 2 billion cars (four times the number currently on the road) from 30 to 60 mpg, with the fuel type and average miles driven (10,000/year) unchanged.

CMI: Efficient Buildings

Article 7 in a series that looks at Princeton's Carbon Mitigation Initiative, which has outlined 15 carbon reduction strategies, in 4 broad categories, each of which could be scaled up to provide 1/7th the CO2 reduction necessary to stabilize the atmosphere.

Carbon Mitigation Initiative:
Category 1: Efficiency and Conservation


Efficient Buildings:
Programs promoting or mandating efficient buildings in the U.S. are still in their infancy. Two voluntary programs deserve special mention.

ENERGY STAR
A section of Energy Star is devoted to promoting efficiency in new and retrofitted homes. Their program focuses on reducing the energy needed for heating and cooling:

Insulation
Sealed Ducts and Leaks
Efficient Windows
Efficient HVAC, Lighting and Appliances

About 200,000 new Energy Star qualified homes were built last year, about 12% of the total, and another 12,000 were overhauled to improve efficiency, bringing the total to 725,000 and 26,000 respectively. Energy Star homes are between 15 and 20% more efficient than those built to "code." Energy Star is currently partnering with about 3,500 builders.

LEED
The organization that has been getting the most media attention is LEED, or Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design. Created by the U.S. Green Building Council, LEED is system that rates buildings for sustainability. According to their web site:

"Based on well-founded scientific standards, LEED emphasizes state of the art strategies for sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency, materials selection and indoor environmental quality. LEED promotes expertise in green building through a comprehensive system offering project certification, professional accreditation, training and practical resources."

While I have had difficulty finding numbers that give an estimate of the impact of LEED, their roster lists something in the neighborhood of 6000 registered projects, representing many million square feet. Given that the certification process only began in the late 1990s, and that in 2002 there were only 12 registered projects, growth in this area has been remarkable. More significantly, thousands of architects and building professionals have become LEED "certified," holding out the promise that these key professionals will make sustainable building the norm.

Certainly, LEED is associated with cutting-edge design, which will hopefully increase its influence, especially with young professionals. One risk, however, which is evident throughout the Green products arena, is that instead of becoming the norm for new buildings, LEED will become more influential as a prestige label. In New York City, certainly, it is best known for a hand-full of ultra-luxury, high-profile "starchitect" projects rather than for more mundane commercial and residential building.

While these voluntary programs have shown impressive growth, again mandatory standards are clearly needed to make sure our building stock is as efficient as possible.

Judging from a paper published on their web site, the National Association of Home Builders is as opposed to mandatory standards as the electricity or auto industries. They draw the following conclusions about emissions tied to residential housing:

• More than half of the energy consumption and CO2 emissions attributable to the residential sector is the result of energy “lost” in the generation and transmission of electricity.

• New homes (those built in the last ten years) account for about 12 percent of residential energy consumption.

• Per square foot, new homes consume less than two-thirds the energy of older homes for the core HVAC uses controllable by builders.

• Behavior of the occupants has a larger impact on non-HVAC energy consumption than those items under the control of the builder.

• More stringent energy conservation requirements for new homes can have a reverse effect of retarding filtering and keeping people in older, less energy-efficient homes.

In other words: the new houses we build are not the problem, old houses are; it's the owners not us; it's the electric companies not us; if you mandate efficient building, people will decide not to move or renovate.

Given the difficulty of educating and motivating 3oo million people, Green Factoids would argue that the least effective and efficient way to control home energy use is by focusing on individual decisions. Is it even helpful for the average person to become knowledgeable about duct-work and high-efficiency windows? It seems clear that if we are going to achieve anything close to one wedge of reductions from efficient buildings, builders should be pressured and ultimately required to maximize efficiency in those areas directly under their control, whether or not homeowners know enough to ask for these measures or not.

CMI: U.S. Programs for Appliance Efficiency Part 3; In Honor of Blog Action Day



Green Factoids would like to recognize BLOG ACTION DAY and thank its organizers. Not only will this effort help us to reach a wide and potentially receptive audience, but the incredible diversity of the blogs represented should also yield lessons on how to tailor the message of sustainability for different audiences.


Article 6 in a series that looks Princeton's Carbon Mitigation Initiative, which has proposed 15 carbon reduction strategies, in 4 broad categories, each of which could be scaled up to provide 1/7th the CO2 reduction necessary to stabilize the atmosphere.

Category 1: Efficiency and Conservation
Efficient Buildings


Discussion of U.S. Programs:
Despite some impressive accomplishments, it is hard not to have regrets about our failings in this area, especially that of efficiency standards. The Department of Energy, which has responsibility over standards, has truly fiddled while Rome burned, slowing down the process so much that they are more than 15 years behind schedule setting standards on many items. According to a report issued this January by the GAO:

DOE has missed all 34 congressional deadlines for setting energy efficient standards for the 20 product categories with statutory deadlines that have passed. DOE's delays ranged from less than a year to 15 years. Rulemakings were completed for only (1) refrigerators, refrigerator-freezers and freezers; (2) small furnaces; and (3) clothes washers. The DOE has yet to finish 17 categories of such consumer products as kitchen ranges and ovens, dishwashers and water heaters and such industrial equipment as distribution transformers. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory estimates that delays in setting standards for the four consumer product categories that consume the most energy - refrigerators and freezers, central air conditioners and heat pumps, water heaters and clothes washers - will cost at least $28B in forgone energy savings by 2030.

According to some analyses, DOE has been so late that the final standards were largely meaningless, offering no efficiency gains over the current performance of the product. In the meantime states have been blocked from setting their own standards. In comparison, Energy Star has been a model of efficiency, expanding its program to cover some 44,000 separate products.


While regrets here are inevitable, they are also pretty much useless, and do not help us devise any plan for reducing emissions from appliances. Green Factoids will restrict itself to a few observations about this complex topic.

The flip side of the DOE’s failure to enact mandatory standards is that we have barely begun to achieve the savings possible in this area.

CMI's numbers on efficiency vindicate the "little steps" approach; in fact, household and building efficiency could provide one seventh the reduction needed to stabilize carbon levels.

The challenge is that this category represents dozens of different products and appliances, and consequently billions of purchasing decisions by virtually every consumer in this country.

From a policy standpoint, mandatory standards are much more effective than voluntary ones. Despite all of the outreach, only a small percentage of all purchases are Energy Star. For example, according to recent estimates, last year CFLs still only represented 6% of all bulbs in the U.S.

Of all of the different areas explored by CMI, efficiency is the only one where any initial expenses are consistently dwarfed by money saved on energy costs. Many mitigation proposals require enormous investments and are far more expensive than more polluting alternatives.

This wedge cannot be achieved without either consumer awareness and action or much more aggressive government regulatory action. Given the current highly polarized political climate, and the anti-regulatory dogmas of influential segments of the political and economic community, we cannot be certain that the government will move to adopt the necessary standards.

In the absence of effective government leadership, it becomes doubly important that Green activists, bloggers, marketers, and concerned citizens push Energy Star every chance we get and are religious about choosing its products for our own purchases.

Perception of public opinion is important—the government is much more likely to adopt regulations that are demanded by voters, or that already represent the bulk of all purchases. Manufacturers will stop trying to block regulations if consumers already strongly favor efficient and “green” models. We should not forget that after millions of consumers moved away from aerosols out of concern for the ozone layer, it became much easier to ban fluorocarbons in consumer products.

In recent years, corporations have proven more receptive to change or susceptible to public pressure than our elected officials, especially at the federal level. Likewise, the government as it currently constituted is much more likely to adopt changes if they are demanded by the business community.

Major Point: Efficiency represents the single biggest source of emissions reduction that is under control of the average consumer. Indeed, of CMI's four categories, efficiency is the only one that is directly affected by our actual behavior and purchases, rather than just our opinions: our appliances, windows, insulation, and water heaters determine the energy use and thus greenhouse emissions of our homes, often for a decade or more.

CMI: U.S. Programs for Appliance Efficiency Part 2

Article 5 in a series that looks Princeton's Carbon Mitigation Initiative, which has proposed 15 carbon reduction strategies, in 4 broad categories, each of which could be scaled up to provide 1/7th the CO2 reduction necessary to stabilize the atmosphere.


Category 1: Efficiency and Conservation
Efficient Buildings

Appliance Efficiency Standards:

Efficiency standards, which are overseen by the Department of Energy, set mandatory baselines for appliance energy use. In a policy development that has strong echoes to today’s battles over carbon emissions, appliance manufacturers initially opposed any standards but eventually came to support federal standards as it became clear that the alternative would be a patchwork of state standards.

Although opposed by anti-regulatory zealots, efficiency standards offer a solution to the problem that the market seems unable to solve by itself: contrary to what we might assume, the market does not offer clear or effective incentives for energy efficient products—to either manufacturers or consumers. Here are a few reasons from the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy, some of which may sound familiar to readers:

* Third-party decision makers (e.g., landlords and builders) who purchase appliances but do not pay the operating costs of the products they purchase;

* Panic purchases that leave little time for consumers to become educated (how many of us have done this?)

* Inadequate and misleading information about the relative energy performance of products; and

* High first costs for efficient equipment due to small production quantities and the fact that manufacturers frequently combine efficiency features with extra non-energy features in expensive "trade-up" models.

Arguably the most effective standard has been for refrigerators, which represent the largest single energy user in many households. Refrigerators in 1972 averaged 1,986 kWh/year; in 1985, they averaged 1077 kWh/year. Power used by the average new refrigerator has continued to drop, falling 49%, from 974 to 500 kWh/year between 1987-2004, even as the units got larger.


Benefits of efficiency standards
Again, from ACEEE:

# In 2000, according to analyses by the U.S. Department of Energy and ACEEE, standards reduced U.S. electricity use by approximately 88 billion kWh and reduced U.S. total energy use by approximately 1,200 trillion Btus. These savings are 2.5% and 1.3% of U.S. electricity and energy use in 2000, respectively.

# In 2000, standards reduced peak generating needs by approximately 21,000 MW — equivalent to displacing seventy 300 MW power plants. Without these savings, current electricity shortages would be significantly worse.

# Over the 1990–2000 period, standards have reduced consumer energy bills by approximately $50 billion. Under standards, equipment prices have risen modestly, but estimates by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and ACEEE indicate that the benefits are more than 3 times the costs on a net present value basis.

# As old appliances and equipment wear out and are replaced, savings from existing standards will steadily grow. By 2010, savings will total more than 250 billion kWh (6.5% of projected electricity use) and reduce peak demand by approximately 66,000 MW (a 7.6% reduction). Over 1990–2030, consumers and businesses are projected to save approximately $186 billion (1997 dollars) from standards already adopted.

CMI: U.S. Programs for Appliance Efficiency Part 1

Article 4 in a series that looks Princeton's Carbon Mitigation Initiative, which has proposed 15 carbon reduction strategies, in 4 broad categories, each of which could be scaled up to provide 1/7th the CO2 reduction necessary to stabilize the atmosphere.


Category 1: Efficiency and Conservation
Efficient Buildings

In the U.S. two government programs emphasize appliance efficiency. One is appliance efficiency standards, overseen by the Department of Energy, and the other is Energy Star, overseen by the EPA in conjunction with the DOE.

Energy Star:

In the U.S. the most well-known program focused on energy efficient appliances is Energy Star. Products that are labeled Energy Star are more efficient than their non-Energy Star counterparts, using between 10 to 75% less energy. According to the EPA's own numbers, during 2006, use of ENERGY STAR products helped Americans prevent about 37 million metric tons of emissions and save about 170 billion kWh, or about 5% of the total 2006 power demand.

In the past 5 years, the total number of Energy Star products sold has doubled, to about 2 billion; the carbon savings associated with Energy Star products has also doubled since 2000, and grew by 10% over the last year. There are now 50 product categories eligible for the Energy Star label, up from only 35 in 2002. About 200,000 new Energy Star qualified homes were built last year, and another 26,000 were completely overhauled to improve efficiency.

Next Post: Appliance Standards

CMI: Building and Appliance Efficiency

Continuing our segment on the Carbon Mitigation Initiative, Green Factoids will consider in more detail the areas which might be capable of providing a whole or partial wedge. In several papers, lead scientists Stephen Pacala and Robert Socolow outline 15 options, each of which could produce one wedge if fully deployed. Seven wedges are needed in order to stabilize the atmospheric CO2 concentrations. Each wedge represents the reduction of 25 billion tons CO2 over the next 50 years, or 1 billion tons per year by 2054.

Category one: ENERGY EFFICIENCY AND CONSERVATION


Energy Efficient Buildings:

Roughly one wedge could be achieved if we install the most efficient lighting, appliances, space heating and cooling, and water heating, and improve insulation in every new and existing building by 2054. Doing so would reduce CO2 emissions by buildings by about one quarter.

One half of these savings are in buildings in developing countries.

They estimate that approximately one quarter of a wedge could be achieved just by switching all incandescent bulbs to CFL's.

Next Post: U.S. Government Efficiency Programs

CMI's Stabilization Categories

Continuing our look at the Carbon Mitigation Initiative, here is a list of the different categories, and the most promising possibilities within those categories, that could be capable of producing a whole or partial wedge of abated emissions. Each wedge effectively prevents 1 billion tons of CO2 emissions per year, or 25 billion tons over the next half century. To stabilize atmospheric carbon concentrations, seven wedges are required.

Wedge Summary Table Category Technology Efficiency Efficient vehicles Reduced use of vehicles Efficient buildings Efficient baseload coal plants Decarbonization of power Gas baseload power for coal baseload power Capture CO2 at baseload power plant Nuclear power for coal power Wind power for coal power PV power for coal power Decarbonization of fuel Capture CO2 at H2 plant Capture CO2 at coal-to-synfuels plant Wind H2 in fuel-cell car for gasoline in hybrid car Biomass fuel for fossil fuel Forests and agricultural soils Reduced deforestation, plus reforestation, afforestation, and new plantations Conservation tillage

The Carbon Mitigation Initiative

In previous posts I have referred to the Carbon Mitigation Initiative, pioneered by Robert Socolow and Stephen Pacala, both of Princeton. As part of their work they have designed a "Stabilization triangle" that illustrates our current emissions trajectory if nothing is done, an increase that will lead to the tripling of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere, and a flat trajectory that will prevent the doubling of concentrations.

In their words:
"In order to avoid a doubling of CO2 and dramatic climate change, society needs to act quickly to deploy low-carbon energy technologies and enhance natural carbon sinks.
The "stabilization wedges" concept illustrates the scale of emissions cuts needed in the future, and provides a common unit for comparing the carbon mitigating capacities of various energy and storage technologies."

Implementing these reductions would prevent 200 billion tons of CO2 emissions between now and 2054. Each of the seven wedges represents reduction in the rate of emissions of 1 billion tons per year by 2054, or 25 billion over the whole period. Their wedges fall into five basic categories: energy conservation, renewable energy, enhanced natural sinks, nuclear energy, and fossil carbon management. All of these reductions can be made using existing and readily available technology, which does not mean that the political and social will is there. In my upcoming posts, I would like to look at some of their numbers, which help illustrate the scope of the challenge and provide a sobering reminder that every nation and sector of society must be involved, and that the average individual only has control over a small part of this effort.

Electricity Factoids

According to the EIA:

In 2005
Emissions from electric plants amounted to 2,513,609,000 Metric Tons of CO2

Electricity Production:
Coal produced: 2,013,179,000 megawatt hours

Natural Gas: 757,974,000 megawatt hours

Nuclear: 781,986,000 megawatt hours

Hydro-electric: 269,587,000 megawatt hours

Renewables: 94,932,000 megawatt hours

Nuclear, hydro and most renewables produce no greenhouse gas emissions.

Between 1994 and 2005:
We increased renewable energy production by 18,400 megawatt hours
We increased coal production by 322,485 megawatt hours

Emissions from Coal

From a National Environmental Trust report on "Sources of Greenhouse Gases in the United States":

Coal accounts for about half of electricity generation in terms of kilowatt hours, but 83% of carbon dioxide emissions from the electricity sector, the largest piece of the pie in terms of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.

Natural gas, in contrast, generates nearly 20% of the country’s electricity but is responsible for 12% of emissions in this sector because it is a less carbon-intensive fuel.

Targeting Methane: Manure

From the EPA web site:

Methane emissions occur whenever animal waste is managed in anaerobic conditions. Liquid manure management systems, such as ponds, anaerobic lagoons, and holding tanks create oxygen free environments that promote methane production. Manure deposited on fields and pastures, or otherwise handled in a dry form, produces insignificant amounts of methane. Currently, livestock waste contributes about 8 percent of human-related methane emissions in the U.S. Given the trend toward larger farms, liquid manure management is expected to increase.

AgSTAR is an outreach program designed to reduce methane emissions from livestock waste management operations by promoting the use of biogas recovery systems. A biogas recovery system is an anaerobic digester with biogas capture and combustion to produce electricity, heat or hot water.

The AgSTAR Program has been very successful in encouraging the development and adoption of anaerobic digestion technology. Since the establishment of the program in 1994, the number of operational digester systems has grown to more than 125 systems across the United States. This has produced significant environmental and energy benefits, including methane emission reductions in 2007 alone of approximately 80,000 metric tons and energy generation of about 275 million kWh. The graph below shows the historical use of biogas recovery technology for animal waste management.

The development of anaerobic digesters for livestock manure treatment and energy production has accelerated at a very fast pace over the past few years. Factors influencing this market demand include: increased technical reliability of anaerobic digesters through the deployment of successful operating systems over the past five years; growing concern of farm owners about environmental quality; an increasing number of state and federal programs designed to cost share in the development of these systems; increasing energy costs and the desire for energy security; and the emergence of new state energy policies (such as net metering legislation) designed to expand growth in reliable renewable energy and green power markets.

Since 2003, methane reductions from operational digester systems have increased almost four fold.

Comment: As with landfill gas, the beauty of the manure digesters is that they not only trap a potent greenhouse gas, but they use that gas to generate electricity--electricity that might otherwise be generated by burning coal.

While the EPA is on the right track, at 125 systems they have just gotten started. According to their own numbers, an 80,000 metric ton reduction represents only about .2% of the 41 million metric tons of methane emissions that come from manure every year. But by some estimates, digesters would be cost-effective on about 7000 dairy and pig farms. These would have a generating capacity of about 722 MW, enough to power about 144,000 homes, and would reduce greenhouse emissions by about 30 million metric tons--the same as removing 4.7 million cars from the road.

One policy point: Given how important the agriculture sector is to tackling climate change, it is especially important that the environmental movement give farmers our support when our interests align. We will need their good will to push more far-reaching changes such as conservation tillage. We should strongly support greatly increased subsidies for biogas digesters--we will be giving farmers another source of income while at the same time preventing water and air pollution as well as methane emissions.

Targeting Methane: Turning Landfill Gas Into Electricity

Most of us love wind (unless we own a house on Nantucket), but let's not forget about the much less glamorous landfill gas, which offers a cheap source of power that puts to use what is now a nuisance gas. Landfills are already there, so using the gas presents far fewer problems with NIMBYism or people worried about their views.

According to these EPA numbers, we are currently exploiting about half the landfill gas potential in the U.S.:

As of December 2006, approximately 425 landfill gas (LFG) energy projects were operational in the United States. These 425 projects generate approximately 10 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity per year and deliver 230 million cubic feet per day of LFG to direct-use applications.

Of the 2,300 or so currently operating or recently closed MSW landfills in the United States, about 400 have LFG utilization projects. We estimate that approximately 560 additional MSW landfills could turn their gas into energy, producing enough electricity to power over 870,000 homes.

Comment: Burning methane produces CO2, but it counts as a renewable energy source since it is basically recycling carbon that was absorbed by (now decomposing) plants and animals. Targeting methane produces a double benefit first by preventing the methane emissions and second by using the methane as a substitute for non-renewable energy sources like coal.

Here are a few back-of the-envelop calculations: Generating 10 billion kWh of electricity from coal would produce more than 10.26 million metric tons of carbon emissions (assuming 2.3 lbs of CO2/kWh).

Using LFG to power another 870,000 homes--roughly another 9.5 billion kWh--would prevent another 9.7 million metric tons of emissions.

In 2006, methane emissions from landfills decreased by 20 million metric tons. If we were to take complete advantage of this resource, we could reduce methane and non-renewable emissions by about 60 MMT of CO2 equivalent--or about 5% of the total emissions from the residential sector (1197 MMT).

In contrast, according to industry numbers, wind currently generates about 17 billion kWh and prevents about 19 million tons of CO2 emissions each year.

Targeting Methane: Landfill Gas

The EPA is working to reduce landfill gas (LFG) emissions, which represent about 25% of human caused methane emissions. Whether through their program or through other means, U.S. LFG emissions are significantly down. Between 1990 and 2004, landfill methane emissions declined by 18%, or 31.4 million metric tons (CO2 equivalent) per year--that represents about .5% of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions for 2004.

The EPA's Landfill Methane Outreach Program:

Accomplishments since program launch in 1994 include the following:

• As of December 2006, LMOP has more than 600 Partners that have signed voluntary agreements to work with EPA to develop cost-effective LFG energy projects.
• LMOP has developed detailed profiles for over 1,300 candidate landfills.
• There are approximately 425 operational LFG energy projects in the United States. In addition, about 120 projects are currently under construction or are exploring development options and opportunities.
• To date, LMOP has assisted in the development of approximately 330 LFG utilization projects - including 32 new projects and 9 project expansions that went online in 2006. These 330 projects have prevented the release of over 24 million metric tons of carbon equivalent (MMTCE - the basic unit of measure of greenhouse gases) into the atmosphere over the past 12 years.
• In the year 2006, all operational LFG energy projects in the United States prevented the release of over 20 MMTCE.
• This reduction is the carbon equivalent of removing the emissions from nearly 14 million vehicles on the road or planting nearly 20 million acres of forest for one year.
• These reductions also have the same environmental benefit as preventing the use of over 169 million barrels of oil or offsetting the use of over 356,000 railcars of coal.

The graph below illustrates the growth of LFG utilization projects before and after LMOP’s inception. The first LMOP-assisted projects started in 1995, as illustrated by the shaded portion atop the 1995 bar. After 1995, the projects are divided into two categories, those that fall under the New Source Performance Standards/Emission Guidlines (NSPS/EG - in blue) and those that don’t (in yellow). Within those two categories, the shaded lines illustrate LMOP assistance. Since 1995, there has been growth in all of the above mentioned areas.

The graph below illustrates LMOP's emission reduction goals as well as performance in relation to these goals. In 2001-2006, LMOP met its goal and anticipates that in future years will continue to meet increasing emission reductions. For 2006, we have broken down the source of the reductions into its three primary components - electricity generation, direct-use, and flaring.

Sources of Methane Emissions

from the EPA:

Human-related Sources

In the United States, the largest methane emissions come from the decomposition of wastes in landfills, ruminant digestion and manure management associated with domestic livestock, natural gas and oil systems, and coal mining. Table 1 shows the level of emissions from individual sources for the years 1990 and 1999 to 2003.

Table 1 U.S. Methane Emissions by Source (TgCO₂ Equivalents)

Source Category	1990	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003
Landfills	172.2	134.0	130.7	126.2	126.8	131.2
Natural Gas Systems	128.3	127.4	132.1	131.8	130.6	125.9
Enteric Fermentation	117.9	116.8	115.6	114.5	114.6	115.0
Coal Mining	81.9	58.9	56.2	55.6	52.4	53.8
Manure Management	31.2	38.8	38.1	38.9	39.3	39.1
Wastewater Treatment	24.8	33.6	34.3	34.7	35.8	36.8
Petroleum Systems	20.0	17.8	17.6	17.4	17.1	17.1
Rice Cultivation	7.1	8.3	7.5	7.6	6.8	6.9
Stationary Sources	7.8	7.1	7.3	6.7	6.4	6.7
Abandoned Coal Mines	6.1	7.3	7.7	6.9	6.4	6.4
Mobile Sources	4.8	3.6	3.4	3.1	2.9	2.7
Petrochemical Production	1.2	1.7	1.7	1.4	1.5	1.5
Iron and Steel	1.3	1.2	1.2	1.1	1.0	1.0
Agricultural Residue Burning	0.7	0.8	0.8	0.8	0.7	0.8
Total for U.S.	605.3	557.3	554.2	546.7	542.3	544.9

Methane Factoids

According to the EPA:

Methane (CH₄) is a principal component of natural gas. It is also formed and released to the atmosphere by biological processes occurring in anaerobic environments. Once in the atmosphere, methane absorbs terrestrial infrared radiation that would otherwise escape to space. This property can contribute to the warming of the atmosphere, which is why methane is a greenhouse gas.

Methane has more than 20 times the heat-trapping capacity of CO2.
The largest human source of U.S. methane emissions are landfills, with 34% of the total.

Other key human sources of methane are natural gas systems, cattle and other animals, wastewater treatment facilities, rice paddies, and coal mines.

Methane represents 7.9% of U.S. global warming gas emissions--these percentages are given in CO2 equivalents, and have already factored in methane's higher Global Warming Potential (GWP).

We reduced emissions of methane by about 10% between 1990-2004; during that period CO2 emissions grew by 20%.

Comment: methane reduction is the ultimate low-hanging fruit. Unlike CO2, which is produced by many necessary and beneficial human activities, a lot of human generated methane comes from poorly managed waste facilities such as landfills, farms, and sewage plants, or from things like leaky gas systems and old coal mines. Often, reduction strategies turn a waste or nuisance gas into an economic asset--as when manure or landfill gas is used to generate electricity. Also, it is much easier to target a few dozen natural gas companies, a few thousand landfills, or even the nation's dairy farmers, than to change the behavior of hundreds of millions of drivers or light bulb users.

1000 New Pets: Worm Composting

Our family has taken up vermiculture, or worm composting, the primary composting method that can work in an apartment.

Basically, it consists of a plastic bin, some shredded, damp newspaper, a supply of red worms, and our fruit and vegetable waste. We obtained our bin and worms from Flowerfield Enterprises, the company founded by the late Mary Appelhof, aka the "worm woman," and author of "Worms Eat My Garbage," which came with our bin. I recommend them highly.

Worm composting can work indoors because it is aerobic, rather than anaerobic, and thus does not produce the offensive odors we usually associate with rotting food. We started our bin about 10 days ago. Since then we have added such yummy articles as mushy carrots, soggy lettuce, old basil, roasted pepper skins, moldy fruit, tomato cores, corn husks, and watermelon rinds. Unlike our garbage can, which in the summer heat smells horrendous after one day, the worm bin smells almost poetically pleasant: phrases such as "a forest after the rain" come to mind.

Worms are extremely low maintenance--for example, you can easily go on vacation for a week or two without worrying about feeding them. You must make sure that the conditions in the bin are okay--not too wet or too dry and adequately aerated. Every few months, you must harvest your worm compost, either by dumping out your worms and separating them from the compost, or by putting new bedding and food on one side of the bin, allowing the worms to migrate, and then removing now mostly-worm free compost.

here is a short list of some of the environmental benefits of worm-composting:
1. it reduces amount of garbage sent to landfills, (including fuel needed to take waste to the dump)

2. it eliminates the methane produced when organic matter decomposes in anaerobic conditions: methane is one of the most potent greenhouse gases with more than 20 times the heat-trapping capacity of CO2; a principal source of methane emissions is dumps

3. worms produce compost which increases the organic matter (and stored carbon) in soil, matter that in many parts of the world is being rapidly depleted through soil erosion

4. worm castings are a form of organic fertilizer that can reduce or eliminate the need for traditional fertilizer, which is energy-intensive to produce and causes serious environmental problems from run-off

Earth 911 has an excellent article about the benefits of compost for your plants.


While these benefits are real enough, the environmental effects of a single family's composting efforts are pretty modest. In the scheme of things, it is probably more important--in the sense of directly beneficial to the planet--for people to cut their electricity and gasoline use than for them to compost 500 pounds of vegetable scrapings each year.

Actually, I think the more significant benefits may be mental, but I think these also need to be articulated and defended.

Our worm bin is an ongoing biological experiment that is (to say the least) educational for the children and adults in our house--there is a good reason these bins are popular in schools. It helps educate my children about waste, ecology, "bugs," and the life cycle, among other things.

Even a few short days of composting has made us all newly conscious of what is going in our garbage can and how much we toss out every week; this awareness is a necessary first step to reducing our waste.

Most importantly for me, composting has enabled our whole family to recognize that our vegetable scrapings are not worthless--they do not have to be garbage. They can be put to use. As a society, we treat many things as garbage that actually have value: we just don't bother to discover and acknowledge that value. Rainwater is another example of this--in NYC we literally mix it with our sewage.

We need a new way to think about waste: one meaning of waste is "by-product," whatever is left over from a process--in this case carrot peels from dinner and worm castings from our bin. But another form of waste--the one that injures our minds in the deepest sense--is the destruction of potential.

These kinds of mental shift are absolutely key if we are going to adapt as a society to confront the challenges ahead of us.

Campaign Against Engine Idling

Environmental Defense featured a story today about NJ's new "Stop the Soot" campaign against engine idling. A new law makes it a crime to idle a diesel engine for more than 3 minutes unless it is very cold or the vehicle is loading or unloading passengers--it is always unlawful to idle for more than 15 minutes. Here are some factoids about engine idling:

From the EPA:
Combined, truck and locomotive idling consumes over 1 billion gallons of diesel fuel annually. Long-duration truck idling consumes approximately 960 million gallons of diesel fuel annually and locomotive switcher idling consumes 60 million gallons of diesel fuel annually.

Long-duration truck idling emits 11 million tons of carbon dioxide, 180,000 tons of nitrogen oxides, and 5,000 tons of particulate matter annually. For detailed information about idling nitrogen oxide emissions view EPA's Study on Long-Duration Truck Idling, above.

From the Natural Resources Canada:

Health impacts of idling

Carbon dioxide is only one by-product of fuel combustion – the vehicles Canadians drive every day also generate other toxic substances that are fouling our air, contributing to urban smog and threatening our health.

Studies by Health Canada and community health departments and agencies have shown a direct link between contaminants in vehicle emissions and significant respiratory health effects. These studies have concluded that poor air quality and smog – caused in part by vehicle exhaust – are resulting in increased hospital admissions, respiratory illnesses and premature deaths, particularly in urban areas.

In fact, Health Canada estimates that more than 5000 Canadians die prematurely each year because of air pollution, and thousands more become unnecessarily ill. Children are particularly vulnerable to air pollution because they breathe faster than adults and inhale more air per kilogram of body weight. Air pollution also causes unnecessary difficulty for elderly people and those with respiratory problems, such as asthma, emphysema and chronic bronchitis.

Comment: Diesel engines are the biggest culprits, but all engine idling wastes gas, causes unnecessary carbon emissions, endangers respiratory health, and even damages engines.

Aluminum Factoids #2

From Earth 911 and the Aluminum Association:

* Over 50% of the aluminum cans produced are recycled.
* A used aluminum can is recycled and back on the grocery shelf as a new can, in as little as 60 days. That’s closed loop recycling at its finest!
* Aluminum is a durable and sustainable metal: 2/3 of the aluminum ever produced is in use today.
* Every minute of everyday, an average of 113,204 aluminum cans are recycled.
* Making new aluminum cans from used cans takes 95 percent less energy and 20 recycled cans can be made with the energy needed to produce one can using virgin ore.
* Recycling one aluminum can saves enough energy to keep a 100-watt bulb burning for almost four hours or run your television for three hours.
* Last year 54 billion cans were recycled saving energy equivalent to 15 million barrels of crude oil - America’s entire gas consumption for one day.
* Tossing away an aluminum can wastes as much energy as pouring out half of that can’s volume of gasoline.
* In 1972, 24,000 metric tons of aluminum used beverage containers (UBCs) were recycled. In 1998, the amount increased to over 879,000 metric tons.
* In 1972, it took about 22 empty, aluminum cans to weigh one pound. Due to advanced technology to use less material and increase durability of aluminum cans, in 2002 it takes about 34 empty aluminum cans to weigh one pound.
* The average employee consumes 2.5 beverages a day while at work.
* The empty aluminum can is worth about 1 cent.


Comment: We use over 80,000,000,000 aluminum soda cans every year, half of which we currently recycle.

Garbage Truck Factoids

Here are some factoids on Garbage Trucks from Inform, an organization dedicated to "pushing the boundaries of green innovation":

GARBAGE TRUCK FACTS

• An estimated 136,000 garbage trucks, 12,000 transfer vehicles, and 31,000 dedicated recycling vehicles haul away America’s garbage (179,000 vehicles in total).
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• An average garbage truck travels 25,000 miles annually, gets less than 3 miles per gallon, and uses approximately 8,600 gallons of fuel each year.
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• Over 40% of garbage trucks are over 10 years old, making it the oldest fleet in the US.
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• The average diesel-powered garbage truck costs over $170,000 and is not retired for 12 years.
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• Over 27,000 organizations in the waste industry employ over 280,000 people.
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• 82% of collection services are carried out by private companies, and 18% by public entities.
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• Industry revenues for 2000, including waste hauling and recycling, exceeded $43 billion.

Recycling in NYC

Here are some waste Factoids from the Council on the Environment of New York City:

NYC residents produce 12,000 tons of waste every day.

Non-recyclable waste generated in New York City is packed on long-haul trucks and driven to landfills in states like Pennsylvania, Ohio and Virginia.

Much of Manhattan’s waste is incinerated across the Hudson in Newark, NJ.

Paper waste that is properly separated from regular garbage is recycled locally or is processed for further recycling overseas. Glass, metal and plastics collected at the curbside are sent to New Jersey, where they are processed and sent to various recycling markets.

Waste in New York City

• New York City residents currently recycle only about 17% of their total waste—half of what is possible to recycle under the current program.
• 7.5% of our waste stream consists of plastic film such as bags from the grocery store
• Clothing and textiles make up 5.7% of our garbage.

Does Recycling Work?

• Paper recycling makes money for NYC, netting $7.5 million after the costs of collection, though almost 15% of our paper is still thrown in the garbage.
• Exporting municipal waste for disposal in other communities will cost New York City taxpayers $290 million in 2007.

Food Recycling?

• 39% of NYC’s waste is organic material, like food scraps and yard waste. Instead of burying this waste in a landfill, it can be composted. Compost is a nutrient-rich, soil-like material made from broken down (i.e. “recycled”) organic material and is a cost-effective, better-quality alternative to chemical fertilizers.
• Each year, the world mines 139 million tons of phosphate and 20 million tons of potash to replace the nutrients that crops remove from the soil.
• When New York City collects trees and yard waste for composting, we offset the cost of collection by saving money in landscaping--the program pays for itself!
  

Waste Less, Breathe More

• Diesel trucks carry Manhattan’s garbage 7.8 million miles every year. That’s the equivalent of driving more than 312 times around the earth!
• Landfills are responsible for 36% of all methane emissions in the US, one of the most potent causes of global warming.

Close the Loop – Buy Recycled

• More than 90 percent of printing and writing paper still comes from virgin tree fiber

Comment: our family has officially started "vermiculture," or worm composting of fruits and vegetable waste. We can also compost non-recyclable paper like napkins and paper towels. Look for more information in upcoming posts.

How much will we have to cut?

Writing for Celsius, Bill Chameides, chief scientist at Environmental Defense, provided this helpful overview of what might be called the Green consensus on what we are going to have to do:

Model calculations indicate that to avoid a temperature increase of 3.6oF, we must stabilize CO2 concentrations at about 450 parts per million (ppm) or less.

This turns out to be a tall order. Today, CO2 concentration is 380 ppm. The rate of increase is about 2 ppm per year, and is expected to accelerate. If we follow a "business as usual" course, we could cross the 450 ppm tipping point well before 2050.

Naturally, the more CO2 we produce, the higher CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Four gigatons of carbon emitted into the atmosphere will raise CO2 concentrations by 1 ppm (see CO2 Arithmetic, Science Magazine). Worldwide, 7 to 8 gigatons of carbon are emitted into the atmosphere each year.

To avoid the tipping point, global CO2 emissions should peak no later than 15 years from now, and then begin to decrease. By 2050, emissions must be about 50 percent less than today, and by the end of the century 75 percent less. (Note that this is a reduction in total emissions, not the reduction relative to projected business-as-usual emissions that President Bush referred to in his 2007 State of the Union address.)

Reducing CO2 emissions by 75 percent will require a profound change in the way we produce and use energy, but there is no need for panic or despair. If we get started now, we can make this transition slowly, a percent or two each year.

Comment: Every bit helps. Changes in habit can be especially useful if they become permanent. The U.S. is incredibly wasteful. Many people pay no attention to their energy usage, running their air-conditioners round the clock, idling their cars for no reason, leaving lights on when they leave the house for the day. Changing these bad habits will yield a big dividend immediately, buying us time to put in place more complex changes such as improving efficiency standards for appliances and gas mileage for cars, and building up our renewable energy capacity.

The Sierra Club has created the 2% solution campaign to help us get started. It helps people set a reasonable goal for themselves and encourages them to become aware of their actual energy usage. See my series on Understand Your Electricity to figure out which electricity cuts will have the most impact.

Getting Rich Going Paperless

It took me a long time to come round to electronic statements and e-bills since I am neurotic about filing and had an irrational fear of computer clutter, irrational because we are utterly drowning (or whatever the metaphor) in paper clutter. But in doing my research for Green Factoids, I realized that if I had gone paperless way back when, I would have been able to check out my old electricity bills so that I could more accurately track our kWh use. Then I discovered some cool factoids about going paperless.

According to Javelin Strategy and Research, here are some of the benefits if all U.S. households viewed and paid bills online:

o Saves 2.3 million tons of wood, or 16.5 million trees.
o Reduces fuel consumption by 26 million BTUs - enough energy to provide residential power to San Francisco for an entire year.
o Decreases toxic air pollutants by 3.9 billion pounds of CO2 equivalents (greenhouse gases), akin to having 355,000 fewer cars on the road.
o Reduces toxic wastewater by 13 billion gallons, enough to fill almost 20,000 swimming pools.
o Lowers solid waste generated by 1.6 billion pounds - equal to 56,000 fully loaded garbage trucks.
o Removes 8.5 million particulates and 12.6 million nitrogen oxides from the air - on par with taking 763,000 buses and 48,000 18-wheelers off the streets.


But imagine this cheapskate’s amazement when I realized that some fund companies, including mutual fund behemoth Vanguard, will waive their yearly fees, now about $20 per year for small investors, if you agree to electronic statements and prospectuses.

So pulling out the old calculator, or actually Quicken’s investment planner, I decided to play with some numbers, and that amazement quickly turned to tears of joy.

Let’s say I treat the fee savings like a $20 investment, to which I add $20 each year. That $20/year is the “principal.” Assuming an 8% investment return I will make:

5 years: $146 (“principal”: $100)
10 years: $332 (“principal”: $200)
20 years: $1008 (“principal”: $400)

PER FUND!!! That’s the miracle of compound interest.


Obviously the environmental benefits are more to the point. But going paperless is yet another powerful example of how eliminating waste also saves money.

Beef Factoids: Water

From Jay Weinstein's The Ethical Gourmet:

here are some comparisons for how many liters of water it takes to produce 1 kilo of various agricultural products:

Potatoes: 500 liters
Wheat: 900 liters
Sorghum: 1,110 liters
Maize: 1,400 liters
Soybeans: 2,000 liters
Chicken: 3,500 liters

Beef (feedlot): 100,000 liters

Maize and Soybeans are grown primarily for feed.

These numbers continue to astound.

Does the U.S. Government Need to Subsidize Driving to Work?

A piece in today's New York Times exposed the government's self-defeating policy contradiction of allowing those who drive to work a tax deduction for parking while at the same time spending millions of dollars to fight traffic congestion. Shockingly, the tax code allows a larger deduction for those who drive than for those who take the train. Hopefully the article will mobilize members of the Green community to complain to their elected officials. The Times estimates that 200,000 drivers in the NY metro area (where parking is especially expensive) take advantage of the parking deduction.

New York Times: Mixed Signals: Driving to Work as a Tax Break

Beef Factoids: Cattle and Rainforests

According to the Nature Conservancy:

In the past 50 years, nearly 15% of Brazil's Amazon forest has been cleared.

Nearly 70% of deforested land in the Amazon is now cattle pasture.

Although ranching is still the biggest threat to Brazil's rainforests, over the last decade large-scale soybean farms have doubled in size, to more than 81,000 square miles.

The vast majority of soy grown in Brazil is exported for cattle and chicken feed.

80% of the world soybean crop is used for animal feed. Only 6% is harvested for direct human consumption in products such as soy milk or tofu.

Comment: Much as it pains us to say it, if you want to reduce your environmental impact, it is crucial that you reduce your consumption of beef.

Beef Factoids: Land

According to the Union of Concerned Scientists' Consumer's Guide to Effective Environmental Choices:

About 800 million acres, or 40% of the U.S. land area, is used for grazing livestock.

Another 60 million acres is used to grow grain for feeding livestock.

American livestock generate more than 2 billion tons of wet manure, over ten times the amount of municipal solid waste generation.

According to Jay Weinstein's The Ethical Gourmet:

About 90% of the grain currently grown in the U.S. is used to feed livestock.

Livestock Factoids: Climate Change

Here are some of the findings from the LEAD (Livestock, Environment and Development) report, "Livestock's Long Shadow," on livestock's effect on the atmosphere and climate:

With rising temperatures, rising sea levels, melting icecaps and glaciers, shifting ocean currents and weather patterns, climate change is the most serious challenge facing the human race.

The livestock sector is a major player, responsible for 18 percent of greenhouse gas emissions measured in CO2 equivalent. This is a higher share than transport.

The livestock sector accounts for 9 percent of anthropogenic CO2 emissions. The largest share of this derives from land-use changes – especially deforestation – caused by expansion of pastures and arable land for feedcrops.

Livestock are responsible for much larger shares of some gases with far higher potential to warm the atmosphere. The sector emits 37 percent of anthropogenic methane (with 23 times the global warming potential (GWP) of CO2) most of that from enteric fermentation by ruminants.

It emits 65 percent of anthropogenic nitrous oxide (with 296 times the GWP of CO2), the great majority from manure.

Livestock are also responsible for almost two-thirds (64 percent) of anthropogenic ammonia emissions, which contribute significantly to acid rain and acidification of ecosystems.

Celsius has an excellent summary of the main findings of this report, "Livestock: Public Enemy Number One."

Bottled Water Factoids

Here are some factoids from the Earth Policy Institute:

The global consumption of bottled water reached 154 billion liters (41 billion gallons) in 2004, up 57 percent from the 98 billion liters consumed five years earlier.

Making bottles to meet Americans’ demand for bottled water requires more than 1.5 million barrels of oil annually, enough to fuel some 100,000 U.S. cars for a year.

Worldwide, some 2.7 million tons of plastic are used to bottle water each year.

According to the Container Recycling Institute, 86 percent of plastic water bottles used in the United States become garbage or litter.

Bottled Water Consumption per Person in Leading Countries, 1999 and 2004
Country	1999	2004
	Liters
Italy	154.8	183.6
Mexico	117.0	168.5
United Arab Emirates	109.8	163.5
Belgium *	121.9	148.0
France	117.3	141.6
Spain	101.8	136.7
Germany	100.7	124.9
Lebanon	67.8	101.4
Switzerland	90.1	99.6
Cyprus	67.4	92.0
United States	63.6	90.5
Saudi Arabia	75.3	87.8
Czech Republic	62.1	87.1
Austria	74.6	82.1
Portugal	70.4	80.3
Global Average	16.3	24.2
* Belgium figures include Luxembourg
Source: Beverage Marketing Corporation, cited in John G. Rodwan, Jr., "Bottled Water 2004: U.S. and International Statistics and Developments," Bottled Water Reporter, April/May 2005.

Bottled Water Consumption in Top Ten Countries and World, 1999 and 2004
Country	1999	2004
	Billion Liters
United States	17.3	25.8
Mexico	11.6	17.7
China	4.6	11.9
Brazil	5.7	11.6
Italy	8.9	10.7
Germany	8.3	10.3
France	6.9	8.5
Indonesia	3.4	7.4
Spain	4.1	5.5
India	1.7	5.1
All Others	25.9	39.9
Total	98.4	154.3
Source: Beverage Marketing Corporation, cited in John G. Rodwan, Jr., "Bottled Water 2004: U.S. and International Statistics and Developments," Bottled Water Reporter, April/May 2005.

CT Rewards Residents Who Cut Electricity

Innovation Awards
CT gets the award for coming up with a plan after Green Factoids’ heart:

Summer Saver - Rewards Program
Save Energy This Summer and Earn a Credit on Your Electric Bill. That's OneThing!

OneThing your utility company is doing to help you conserve energy is giving you a reward for saving! If you use less electricity this summer than you did last summer, you can earn a credit on your electric bill.
Summer Saver Rewards Program

You are eligible if:

* You are a residential or commercial customer of CL&P or UI.
* You will be an active customer for the entire period of July 1, 2007 through September, 2007.
* You were an active customer for the entire period of July 1, 2006 through September, 2006.
* You have had continuous service at the same location for both time periods.

How it works:
Your electric utility company will compare how much electricity you used this summer (from July 1 through September 30, 2007) to how much you used last summer (July 1 through September 30, 2006). If you're able to reduce your usage by at least 10%, you earn a credit on your electric bill!

What you can earn:

* Use at least 10% less electricity this summer and earn a credit equal to 10% percent of the billed generation charges for the eligibility period.
* Use at least 15% less electricity this summer and earn a credit equal to 15% percent of the billed generation charges for the eligibility period.
* Use at least 20% less electricity this summer and earn a credit equal to 20% percent of the billed generation charges for the eligibility period.

Comment: This plan gets it right for several reasons. First, it rewards people who cut electricity during the critical summer months, using a fair, sensible scheme. It is only available to people who have lived in the same house for the past two years and are thus in the position to track their use and make real cuts. However, what Green Factoids especially appreciates is that the plan should motivate people to UNDERSTAND THEIR ELECTRICITY, which regular readers know has been the subject of most of this summer's posts. You won't have much success cutting unless you know how much power your appliances actually use. Hopefully, participants will quickly realize that junking their 300 watt halogen fixtures and turning off their 3500 watt central A/C will get them to their goal a lot faster than unplugging their 2 watt "vampire" VCR on standby. CT should throw in a 'Kill-a-watt' meter for good measure.