- Joined
- Jul 19, 2012
- Messages
- 14,185
- Reaction score
- 8,768
- Location
- Houston
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Libertarian
The International Energy Agency is reporting data showing that economic growth is being increasingly decoupled from carbon dioxide emissions. Basically, human beings are using less carbon dioxide intensive fuels to produce more goods and services. The IEA attributes the relatively steep drop in U.S. emissions largely to the ongoing switch by electric generating companies from coal to cheap natural gas produced using fracking from shale deposits. Renewals also contributed a bit to the decline. From the IEA:
Global energy-related carbon dioxide emissions were flat for a third straight year in 2016 even as the global economy grew.
CO2 emissions world wide have probably not peaked, but this development is good news for those concerned about this matter. It's a bit of a stretch to say that the economy has been "decoupled" from CO2 emissions since cheap energy from carbon fuels is very much needed and will be for the foreseeable future. This progress is the result of more efficient, improved technology.
CO2 emitted by natural gas is half that of a comparable amount of coal. Electricity from natural gas now exceeds that from coal in the US.
More than half of global energy growth is from renewables, and most of that is from hydropower.
Of course, environmentalists have opposed both fracking and the damming of rivers for hydropower.
U.S. Carbon Dioxide Emissions Fall 3 Percent - Hit & Run : Reason.com