Think Greener Reducing Fossil Fuel Dependency
Burning oil, coal and methane make up large amounts of greenhouse gasses causing climate change. Good news, oil is on its way out! The other day, I received a call from a bicycle shop indicating that our e-bicycles should be ready for pickup within the next couple of days! The faster society can switch to an electric car or e-bike, the quicker the internal combustion engines can be decommissioned, which are expected to be obsolete by 2040.
Coal is also on a steep decline. Large coal fired power plants are being shut down around the world as renewable energy is replacing the need to burn fossil fuels.
Methane, also known as natural gas, is the next fuel to be phased out. In 2019, California banned using natural gas in new construction. 50 cities have already adopted the ban to avoid expensive retrofit in the future. Did you know devastating effects of methane? It has 80 times more global warming power than CO2.
The methane industry will make every effort to resist this clean energy transition, even though they are aware it is clearly harming the world we all inhabit. Much like large industries that produce oil, tobacco or oxycontin. Be careful of the term renewable natural gas (RNG), as it is an example of green washing used to distract the dangers of methane gas. RNG is gas that comes from biological sources such as landfills, livestock, or human sewage. Did you know there are more pigs than humans in North Carolina and Iowa? There are significant problems with renewable natural gas. It is a very expensive process; it is not carbon free and there is not enough RNG for large scale distribution. Yes, it does come from existing sources of methane. However, this can all be designed out of the supply chain. For example, removing food scraps from the landfill by using composting methods to create healthy soil, would eliminate the need for capturing and burning methane from landfills. Shifting towards a plant-based diet and reducing the livestock industry is another means of reducing methane from the supply chain.
Let’s stay focused on real sustainable, renewable solutions such as clean electrification (solar & wind) for heating and cooling, while replacing all three fossil fuel sources to help our world achieve carbon neutrality.