14 DAY TRIAL // This past Tuesday, the Environmental Protection Agency in the United States issued a new report saying that, in 2012, the country released less greenhouse gas emissions than the year before.
On its website, the Agency details that, according to information at hand, the country's emissions in 2012 amounted to approximately 6,526 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent.
When compared to 2011, this amount of greenhouse gas emissions constitutes a 3.4% drop. What's more, specialists with the Environmental Protection Agency say that, when the 2005 is taken as a baseline, emissions documented in 2012 were about 10% lower.
Still, when compared to emissions reported back in 1990, those documented in 2012 were found to be slightly higher, the Agency stresses in the Executive Summary of its report.
“In 2012, total US greenhouse gas emissions wer 6,525.6 Tg, or million metric tons, CO2 Eq. Total US emissions have increased by 4.7% from 1990 to 2012, and emissions decreased from 2011 to 2012 by 3.4% (227.4 Tg CO2 Eq),” the Environmental Protection Agency details.
The Agency says that, all things considered, the United States owes this drop in greenhouse gas emissions to the fact that, as of recently, power plant operators in this country have taken an interest in natural gas as opposed to coal.
Since natural gas has been documented to cause less environmental pollution than coal when used for energy generation, specialists believe that its growing in popularity most likely played a major role in helping the United States reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.
By the looks of it, improvements in fuel efficiency in the transportation sector, together with a fairly warm winter that limited the need to turn on heating, also had a say in the matter, the Environmental Protection Agency concludes.
“The decrease from 2011 to 2012 was due to a decrease in the carbon intensity of fuels consumed by power producers to generate electricity due to a decrease in the price of natural gas, a decrease in transportation sector emissions attributed to a small increase in fuel efficiency across different transportation modes and limited new demand for passenger transportation, and much warmer winter conditions resulting in a decreased demand for heating fuel in the residential and commercial sectors.”
The Environmental Protection Agency adds that, of the total amount of greenhouse gas emissions that the United States released back in 2012, carbon dioxide accounted for an impressive 82%. Other greenhouse gases that the country released are methane and nitrous oxide.