Tag Archives: Air Quality

Air Quality, Carbon dioxide, Carbon emissions, Coal, Fossil fuels, Natural gas, Petroleum

Energy-related CO2 emissions decreased in nearly every state from 2005 to 2013

Repost from the U.S. Energy Information Administration

Energy-related carbon dioxide emissions decreased in nearly every state from 2005 to 2013

November 23, 2015, Principal contributor: Perry Lindstrom
graph of per-capita energy-related carbon dioxide emissions by state, as explained in the article text
Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Energy-Related Carbon Dioxide Emissions at the State Level, 2000-13.   Note: Click to see information for all states.

The United States has a diverse energy landscape that is reflected in differences in state-level emissions profiles. Since 2005, energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions fell in 48 states (including the District of Columbia) and rose in 3 states. EIA’s latest analysis of state-level energy-related CO2 emissions includes data in both absolute and per capita terms, including details by fuel and by sector.

This analysis measures emissions released at the location where fossil fuels are consumed. Therefore, to the extent that fuels are used in one state to generate electricity that is consumed in another state, emissions are attributed to the former rather than the latter. An analysis attributing emissions to the consumption of electricity, rather than to the production of electricity, would yield different results.

map of changes in proved reserves by state/area, as explained in the article text
Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Energy-Related Carbon Dioxide Emissions at the State Level, 2000-13.   Note: Click to see information for all states.

The 10 states with the highest levels of energy-related CO2 emissions in 2013 accounted for half of the U.S. total. These 10 states also have large populations and account for slightly more than half (53%) of the nation’s total population. California was the second-highest emitter in absolute terms (353 million metric tons of carbon dioxide, or MMmt CO2), behind only Texas (641 MMmt CO2). But California was also the fourth-lowest emitter on a per capita basis, behind the District of Columbia, New York, and Vermont. Relatively small states such as Wyoming and North Dakota had much higher levels of per capita emissions in 2013, nearly seven times and five times the national average, respectively.

Energy-related CO2 emissions come from coal, petroleum, and natural gas consumed within a state to produce electricity (38% of U.S. total), to transport goods or people (33%), to operate industrial processes (18%), or to directly fuel equipment in residential and commercial buildings (10%). The consumption levels by fuel and by sector vary considerably by state. For example, coal consumption accounted for 78% of energy-related CO2 emissions in West Virginia in 2013, while coal only accounted for 1% of emissions in California.

Consumption of petroleum accounted for more than 90% of energy-related CO2 emissions in two states, Hawaii and Vermont, but for different reasons. In both states, emissions from the transportation sector accounted for more than 50% of energy-related emissions. In Vermont, the nonelectric (or direct) residential share of total emissions was 23%, mostly from petroleum-based fuels such as heating oil used to fuel furnaces and water heaters. Vermont’s electric power sector share of emissions from petroleum was only 0.2%, as very little of the state’s electricity in 2013 was generated from petroleum or any other fossil fuels. Hawaii, on the other hand, has very little direct use of petroleum for residential heating but much higher use of petroleum for power generation.

More information about each state’s energy-related CO2 emissions is available in EIA’s report, Energy-Related Carbon Dioxide Emissions at the State Level, 2000-13.

Principal contributor: Perry Lindstrom
Air Quality, Carbon dioxide, Carbon emissions, Coal, Fossil fuels, Natural gas, Petroleum

U.S. Energy Information Administration Report: Energy-Related CO2 Emissions, 2014

Repost from U.S. Energy Information Administration

U.S. Energy-Related Carbon Dioxide Emissions, 2014

Release Date: November 23, 2015   |  Next Release Date: October 2016   |    full report

U.S. Energy-related carbon dioxide emissions increased 0.9% in 2014

  • Energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions increased by 50 million metric tons (MMmt), from 5,355 MMmt in 2013 to 5,406 MMmt in 2014.
  • The increase in 2014 was influenced by the following factors:
    • Real gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 2.4%;
    • The carbon intensity of the energy supply (CO2/Btu) declined by 0.3%; and
    • Energy intensity (British thermal units[Btu]/GDP) declined by 1.2%.
  • Therefore, with GDP growth of 2.4% and the overall carbon intensity of the economy (CO2/GDP) declining by about 1.5%, energy-related CO2 grew 0.9%.

USEIA chart CO2 2014 - 2015-11-23

[This report continues with 12 charts that further break down the analysis of CO2 emissions in 2014.  The report concludes with a fascinating section on Implications of the 2014 carbon dioxide emissions increase.  …CONTINUED ON THE WEB PAGE…  Or … the same information is available as a PDF download.]

Air Quality, Crude By Rail, donner, Electronically controlled pneumatic braking (ECP), Emergency Readiness & Response, Explosion, Noise pollution, Oil stabilization, Oil storage, Positive Train Control, Revised Draft EIR, Valero Benicia Refinery, Valero Crude By Rail

Davis Enterprise Editorial: Benicia washes its hands of us

Repost from the Davis Enterprise

Our view: Benicia washes its hands of us

By Our View | November 15, 2015

The issue: Bay Area city can’t see past its own back yard on refinery project

The city of Benicia — the only entity capable of exerting any control over the crude-oil shipments set to arrive at a planned expansion of a Valero oil terminal — has shown in a draft environmental impact report that any impact the terminal has on communities farther up the train tracks is none of its business.

THE PROPOSED project would allow Valero to transport crude oil to its Benicia refinery on two 50-car freight trains daily on Union Pacific tracks that come right through Davis, Dixon, Fairfield and Suisun City on their way to Benicia. The rail shipments would replace up to 70,000 barrels per day of crude oil currently transported to the refinery by ship, according to city documents.

The original draft EIR, released in 2014, didn’t adequately address safety and environmental concerns. Local governments — including the city of Davis, Yolo County and the Sacramento Area Council of Governments — weighed in on the draft, urging Benicia to take a second look.

Benicia withdrew the draft and went back to work, and the new document acknowledges the risks of pollution, noise and, oh yes, catastrophic explosions from oil trains, the likes of which leveled Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, in 2013.

Disappointingly, having recognized the issues involved, the report simply says there’s no way to mitigate them and recommends moving ahead. With a bureaucratic shrug of the shoulders, the concerns of communities from Roseville to Suisun City are dismissed.

NATURALLY, SACOG disagrees, and so do we. While it’s true that there’s not a lot Benicia can do itself to mitigate the impact of its project, it can force Valero to do something about it.

SACOG urges a raft of measures that are within Valero’s control: advanced notification to local emergency personnel of all shipments, limits on storage of crude-oil tanks in urban areas, funding to train emergency responders, cars with electronically controlled pneumatic brakes, money for rail-safety improvements, implementation of Positive Train Control protocols and, most importantly, a prohibition on shipments of unstabilized crude oil that hasn’t been stripped of the volatile elements that made Lac-Mégantic and other derailments so catastrophic.

Due to federal laws, cities along the railway lines have no ability to control what goes through. Only Benicia, now, while the project is still on the drawing board, has the authority to set reasonable limits and conditions on a project that puts millions of people along the railroad in harm’s way.

We urge the Benicia City Council to use its discretionary authority in this matter to protect those of us who have no say in the process.

Air Quality, Bakken Crude, Benicia Industrial Park, Carbon emissions, Climate Change, Crude By Rail, Derailment, Environmental review, Explosion, Public Health, Public permitting, Public Safety, Revised Draft EIR (RDEIR), Tar sands crude, Valero Crude By Rail

An Ethical Case Against Valero Crude By Rail

By Roger D. Straw, Benicia Herald Editor
October 30, 2015

Roger D. StrawIn June of 2013, I wrote a guest opinion for the Benicia Herald, “Do Benicians want tar-sands oil brought here?” I had just learned that the City of Benicia staff was proposing to give Valero Refinery a quick and easy pass to begin construction of an offloading rack for oil trains carrying “North American crude.” Valero was seeking permission to begin bringing in two 50-car Union Pacific trains every day, filled with a crude oil. Valero and the City would not disclose where the oil was coming from, but everyone knew of the boom in production in Canada (tar-sands crude) and North Dakota (Bakken crude).

At that time, my most pressing concern was that Benicia, my home town, not be the cause of destruction elsewhere. Tar-sands oil strip mining is the dirtiest, most energy-intensive and environmentally destructive oil production method in the world. It struck me then, and it still does, as a moral issue. Our beautiful small City on the Carquinez has a conscience. We have a global awareness and a responsibility to all who live uprail of our fair city. Our decisions have consequences beyond our border.

My article, and my conscience-driven concern, came BEFORE the massive and deadly oil train explosion in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec. That wreck and the many horrific explosions that followed involving Bakken crude oil and tar-sands “dilbit” (diluted bitumen) became the sad poster children of a movement to STOP crude by rail. It became all too easy for Benicians to base our opposition on a very legitimate self-protective fear. Not here. Not in our back yard. No explosions in OUR Industrial Park, in our town, on our pristine bit of coastal waters.

But fear mustn’t deaden our heart.

I was encouraged to read in the City’s recent Revised Draft EIR, that the document would analyze environmental impacts all the way to the train’s point of origin, including North Dakota and Canada:

“In response to requests made in comments on the DEIR, the City is issuing this Revised DEIR for public input to consider potential impacts that could occur “uprail” of Roseville, California (i.e., between a crude oil train’s point of origin and the California State border, and from the border to Roseville) and to supplement the DEIR’s evaluation of the potential consequences of upsets or accidents involving crude oil trains based on new information that has become available since the DEIR was published.” [emphasis added]

Sadly, the City’s consultants never made good on their intention. Our moral obligation to those uprail of Benicia extends, according to the consultants, to our neighbors in Fairfield, Vacaville, Davis, Sacramento, Roseville and to the good folks and mountain treasures beyond, but ONLY TO CALIFORNIA’S BORDER. What happens at the source, in Canada where boreal forests and humans and wildlife are dying; what happens in North Dakota where the night is now lit and the earth is polluted wholesale with oil fracking machinery – what happens there is of no concern to Benicians. Too far away to care. Their air, their land, their water is not our air, land and water. Evidently, according to our highly paid consultants, this is not, after all, one planet.

Or is it?

Our Planning Commissioners have more than a civic duty. They and we are called morally and ethically to understand our larger role in climate change and to protect the earth and its inhabitants. Our decision has consequences.

Together, we can STOP crude by rail.