Posts tagged greenhouse
Sturtz & Copeland – Mother’s Day Hanging Baskets and Spring Flowers
May 9th
Carol Riggs shows us the new Spring flowers, plants, hanging baskets, flower pots, sculptures, fountains and some wonderful things for your home and great gifts for Mother’s Day at Sturtz & Copeland in Boulder. We look at some whimsical sculptures and decorations, the flowers and hanging baskets, the large selection of pots and the fabulous fountains for your home and garden.
CU: Gas-fired plants help clean the air
Jan 10th
Power plants that use natural gas and a new technology to squeeze more energy from the fuel release far less of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide than coal-fired power plants do, according to a new analysis accepted for publication Jan. 8 in Earth’s Future, a journal of the American Geophysical Union. The so-called “combined cycle” natural gas power plants also release significantly less nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide, which can worsen air quality.
“Since more and more of our electricity is coming from these cleaner power plants, emissions from the power sector are lower by 20, 30 even 40 percent for some gases since 1997,” said lead author Joost de Gouw, an atmospheric scientist with NOAA’s Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) at the University of Colorado Boulder. NOAA is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
De Gouw, who works at NOAA’s Earth System Research Laboratory (ESRL), and his NOAA and CIRES colleagues analyzed data from systems that continuously monitor emissions at power plant stacks around the country. Previous aircraft-based studies have shown these stack measurements are accurate for carbon dioxide (CO2) and for nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide. Nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide can react in the atmosphere to form tiny particles and ozone, which can cause respiratory disease.
To compare pollutant emissions from different types of power plants, the scientists calculated emissions per unit of energy produced, for all data available between 1997 and 2012. During that period of time, on average:
- Coal-based power plants emitted 915 grams (32 ounces) of CO2 per kilowatt hour of energy produced;
- Natural gas power plants emitted 549 grams (19 ounces) CO2 per kilowatt hour; and
- Combined cycle natural gas plants emitted 436 grams (15 ounces) CO2 per kilowatt hour.
In combined cycle natural gas plants, operators use two heat engines in tandem to convert a higher fraction of heat into electrical energy. For context, U.S. households consumed 11,280 kilowatt hours of energy, on average, in 2011, according to the U.S. Energy Information Agency. This amounts to 11.4 metric tons per year of CO2 per household, if all of that electricity were generated by a coal power plant, or 5.4 metric tons if it all came from a natural gas power plant with combined cycle technology.
The researchers reported that between 1997 and 2012, the fraction of electric energy in the United States produced from coal gradually decreased from 83 percent to 59, and the fraction of energy from combined cycle natural gas plants rose from none to 34 percent.
That shift in the energy industry meant that power plants, overall, sent 23 percent less CO2 into the atmosphere last year than they would have, had coal been providing about the same fraction of electric power as in 1997, de Gouw said. The switch led to even greater reductions in the power sector’s emissions of nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide, which dropped by 40 percent and 44 percent, respectively.
The new findings are consistent with recent reports from the Energy Information Agency that substituting natural gas for coal in power generation helped lower power-related carbon dioxide emissions in 2012.
The authors noted that the new analysis is limited to pollutants emitted during energy production and measured at stacks. The paper did not address levels of greenhouse gases and other pollutants that leak into the atmosphere during fuel extraction, for example. To investigate the total atmospheric consequences of shifting energy use, scientists need to continue collecting data from all aspects of energy exploration, production and use, the authors concluded.
Authors of the new paper, “Reduced Emissions of CO2, NOx and SO2 from U.S. Power Plants Due to the Switch from Coal to Natural Gas with Combined Cycle Technology,” are de Gouw (CIRES), David Parrish (NOAA ESRL), Greg Frost (CIRES) and Michael Trainer (NOAA).
CIRES is a joint institute of NOAA and CU-Boulder.
-CU-
ESA: So much accomplished, so much to do
Nov 13th
BC1 news editor
The federal Endangered Species turns 40 years old this year. It was signed into law by Richard (“I am not a crook”) Nixon, in 1973, likely as a desperation move to garner public support for his collapsing presidency. The significance of this law is that, for the first time in history federal law recognized there are limits to economic development —i.e. when a species would be driven to extinction as a result of the activities. That, my friends, is a Line in the Sand.
The ESA has been incredibly effective, thanks almost entirely to the Center for Biological Diversity, which was instrumental in protecting more than 1,400 species and 200 million acres of critical habitat in the U.S. alone. Ninety nine percent of species protected by the ESA have been saved from extinction. The CBD uses law and science to make its case, bucking the trend of most major environmental groups, which rarely sue any longer for any reason. This happened because BIG OIL has undue influence in the environmental community by having representatives on the environmental groups’ board of directors and by funding these groups with the tacit understanding that the groups won’t oppose projects beneficial to oil and gas profits. Nevertheless, current trends are threatening to reverse the situation. Global climate change could be the most damaging threat in history, with profound implications for both animals and human beings. There are others.
To honor the ESA, Boulder Channel 1 will run a series of articles about the most serious of these threats.
By the Center for Biological Diversity
FRACKING THREATENS AMERICA’S AIR, WATER AND CLIMATE It poisons our water, contaminates our air and emits massive greenhouse gas pollution. Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, involves blasting huge volumes of water mixed with toxic chemicals and sand deep into the earth to fracture rock formations and release oil and natural gas. This extreme form of energy production endangers our health and wildlands.
A fracking boom can transform an area almost overnight, creating massive new environmental and social problems. Fracking development is intensifying in Pennsylvania, Texas and North Dakota and moving into new areas, like California and Nevada. Will your state be fracked next? But as fracking spreads across America, communities are fighting back — and the Center for Biological Diversity is working to ban this growing threat. POLLUTING AIR AND WATER, KILLING WILDLIFE
About 25 percent of fracking chemicals could cause cancer, scientists say. Others harm the skin or reproductive system. Evidence is mounting throughout the country that these chemicals — as well as methane released by fracking — are making their way into aquifers and drinking water. Fracking can release dangerous petroleum hydrocarbons, including benzene and xylene. It also increases ground-level ozone levels, raising people’s risk of asthma and other respiratory illnesses. Wildlife is also in danger. Fish die when fracking fluid contaminates streams and rivers. Birds are poisoned by chemicals in wastewater ponds. And the intense industrial development accompanying fracking pushes imperiled animals out of wild areas they need to survive. In California, for example, more than 100 endangered and threatened species live in the counties where fracking is set to expand. DISRUPTING
OUR CLIMATE Fracking releases large amounts of methane, a dangerously potent greenhouse gas. Fracked shale gas wells, for example, may have methane leakage rates as high as 7.9 percent, which would make such natural gas worse for the climate than coal. But fracking also threatens our climate in another way. To prevent catastrophic climate change, we must leave about 80 percent of proven fossil fuel reserves in the ground. Fracking takes us in the opposite direction, opening up vast new deposits of fossil fuels. If the fracking boom continues, oil and gas companies will light the fuse on a carbon bomb that will shatter efforts to avert climate chaos. BAN FRACKING NOW To protect our environment from fracking, we must prohibit this inherently dangerous technique. That’s why the Center supports fracking bans and moratoriums at the local, state and national levels. Learn about fracking and please take action against it today.