Going Green
by There is one area, though, where we could do more to reduce our energy dependence. Housing. As America begins the difficult task of pulling itself out of economic disaster, the time is perfect to make a minor adjustment in housing. Rather than building new houses to be merely energy efficient, we should begin building them to be energy self sufficient. There is no reason at all why we cannot incorporate solar and/or wind power generation methods in every house or other structure we build.
The power company loses because they aren’t selling as much energy AND they are required by law to buy back any extra power the devices generate not used by the homeowner.
Let’s take a closer look at that last issue. That extra energy is put into the grid and consumed by other customers. The power company is required to purchase that power from the homeowner. They then turn around and sell that same energy to your neighbor at three or four times their purchase price. So they aren’t really losing any money on that deal.
If America takes the lead in this area it will reduce our dependency on foreign energy sources. By how much is anybody’s guess. At first, the reduction would not be significant, but as time goes on, that reduction increases exponentially. Eventually we will be at the point where we will have eliminated our dependency on foreign energy.
Why is that important? Currently, oil is one of the ways we generate electricity. We consume millions of barrels of oil every year to accomplish this. By building alternative energy generation sources into homes, this reduces the amount of oil we need to purchase abroad. That much less money is being used to support regimes that are enemies of the United States.
Beyond that issue, look at how much pollution will be decreased. We currently import 21 million barrels of oil every day. In other words, we import almost 25% of the world’s total oil production every single day. While only a percentage of that oil is used to generate electricity, look at these statistics.
- Oil power plants produce nitrogen oxide, carbon dioxide, methane, sulfur dioxide, and mercury compounds. Sulfur dioxide and mercury compound amounts can vary greatly depending on the sulfur and mercury content of the oil burned.
- On average the emission rates in the United States from electricity generation from oil are: 1672 lbs/MWh of carbon dioxide, 12 lbs/MWh of sulfur dioxide, and 4 lbs/MWh of nitrogen oxides.
- Additionally, oil wells and oil collection equipment emit methane, a greenhouse gas.
- The vehicles and equipment used in drilling, production, and transportation of oil burn natural gas or diesel which also produce pollution.
Decreasing the amount of electricity produced by oil alone will dramatically decrease noxious pollutants put into the atmosphere. When you add the reduction of coal and natural gas generated pollution one can see how much cleaner our air will become. Remember, this article is only dealing with the reduction of air pollution. Oil, coal and natural gas electric plants generate other contaminants which find their way into our water supply and the ground.
If we all sponsored legislation in our respective states requiring alternative energy generators to be built into all new buildings, we can go a very long way toward cleaning up our planet and reducing our dependency on foreign energy sources. This solution will not solve all our energy problems, but it will solve a very large portion of them.
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