Wednesday, February 18, 2015

It's a tie between nuclear and renewables

I've been thinking about that chart I mentioned yesterday. Here it is:

That chart is from the US Energy Administration, and it depicts projections of electricity generation in the US by source. I find it interesting that every source of energy in the chart is projected to decrease by 2040, except for natural gas. It seems that we're sitting on a massive pile of it so it's going to be cheap compared to other sources.

It's hard to say if this is based entirely on policy projections or the reality that it just takes a lot of time to build out renewable infrastructure that is going to replace carbon. The projection is that carbon will be the source of 67% of our energy, even by 2040.

The takeaway from this is that if we're going to cut carbon, we're going to need political willpower to do it. A ton of it. Now.

So what do we get instead? A Congress obsessed with a single oil pipeline that goes straight from Canada to a port in the Gulf of Mexico.

No comments: