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| City dwellers produce less carbon, report suggests |
| 2008-05-30 |
| While cities are hot spots for global warming, people living in them turn out to be greener than their country cousins. Obviously it's because Each resident of the largest 100 largest metropolitan areas is responsible on average for 2.47 tons of carbon dioxide in energy consumption each year, 14 percent below the 2.87 ton U.S. average, researchers at the Brookings Institution say in a report being released Thursday. Those 100 cities still account for 56 percent of the nation's carbon dioxide pollution. But their greater use of mass transit and population density reduce the per person average. "It was a surprise the extent to which emissions per capita are lower," Marilyn Brown, a professor of energy policy at the Georgia Institute of Technology and co-author of the report, said in an interview. Metropolitan area emissions of carbon dioxide are highest in the eastern U.S., where people rely heavily on coal for electricity, the researchers found. They are lower in the West, where weather is more favorable and where electricity and motor fuel prices have been higher. The study examined sources and use of residential electricity, home heating and cooling, and transportation in 2005 in the largest 100 metropolitan areas where two-thirds of the people in the U.S. live. It attributed a wide disparity among the 100 cities to population density, availability of mass transit and weather. Lexington, Kentucky, had the biggest per capita carbon footprint: Each resident on average accounted for 3.81 tons of carbon dioxide in their energy usage. At the other end of the scale was Honolulu, at 1.5 tons per person. Carbon dioxide is released from burning fossil fuels and is the leading "greenhouse gas." It drifts into the atmosphere and forms a blanket that traps the Earth's warmth. About 6.6 billion tons of carbon dioxide are released into air annually in the United States. From 2000 to 2005, carbon dioxide from transportation, electricity use and residential heating in the largest metropolitan areas increased 7.5 percent. For the entire nation, it rose 9.1 percent. The average per capita footprint in those 100 cities rose at an annual rate of 1.1 percent a year, half the average yearly increase of 2.2 percent nationwide. In explaining differences among cities, the researchers cited weather, the type of fuel used for heating and cooling, the development of rail transportation, the amount of urban sprawl and the cost of energy. Cities with the largest carbon footprints are mostly in the eastern half of the country from Indiana to western Pennsylvania -- areas that rely heavily on coal for electricity production and natural gas for heating. The smallest carbon footprint was in cities in the West and New England. Half of the dozen cities with the stingiest carbon output were in California, where electricity prices and motor fuels are expensive. Also cited was the Seattle-Portland, Ore., region, which relies heavily on hydropower. Cities in Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana dominated the bottom tier of high carbon emitters. These urban areas are "kind of a poster child of what high carbon intensive growth looks like," said Brown. She noted their reliance on coal for electricity and natural gas for heating, a shortage of mass transit, and often older, energy-inefficient buildings. |
| Posted by:gorb |
| #4 Carbon dioxide is released from burning fossil fuels and is the leading "greenhouse gas." Again with the CO2 nonsense. Water vapor, not CO2, is the biggest greenhouse gas, accounting for 95% of all greenhouse warming. Carbon dioxide is present at about 4%, while methane and all the rest account for less than 1%. But as long as the "news" people can claim CO2 is the "leading" greenhouse gas, they can frighten people into giving up even more of their freedoms. Anyone writing such nonsense should be taken out and staked to the top of one of the cooling towers at a nuke plant for a year or two. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2008-05-30 15:36 |
| #3 Soooo..., not only are Kentucky voters so stoopid that they vote for Hillarity instead of the Messiah, now we find that they are the very ones most responsible for this outrageous Carbon footprint. Horrors ! |
| Posted by: Woozle Elmeter 2700 2008-05-30 11:39 |
| #2 This is nonsense playing with numbers. City dwellers share heat seeking carbon producing assets that lower their individual numbers but increase the entire picture for the city. For example the lights that are on all night, the billboards, Elevators use up more energe than a first floor entrance, subways that still run when few or no people are using them or even when they are virtually empty. Juice is still pumping through that third rail and that juice is produced somewhere. City dwellers also have far fewer carbon sinks. Grass and gardens per dweller. Yeah they often have massive parks, and I bet they'd love to claim that but if we're talking per individual dweller I don't think they should count. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2008-05-30 11:30 |
| #1 Gee, once again, an "experts report" says city-dwelling northeastern liberals are more planet friendly than southern conservative rural troglodytes. Color me skeptical... |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2008-05-30 10:59 |