I’m writing on the south bank of the Columbia River here in Boardman, Oregon (population 3,500). I went running last night at sunset . . . oh my. Beautiful; what a joy. I found deer tracks on the sandy beach and looked to the west, where Mount Hood was a tiny, rosy peak in the far distance.
Oregon’s only coal-fired energy plant was just a few miles to the south. This is the plant that supplies about 20% of the state’s energy, and the one that the Oregonian reported yesterday to be polluting the state’s air even more than previously thought. And coal emissions are a prime cause of global warming.
How about some energy conservation? Here in my hotel room, if and when I turn on the bathroom light, I immediately am hit with waves of heat from all of eight incandescent light-bulbs, each the size of my fist. Most hotels in the U.S. are still wasting energy like this. Compact fluorescents (CFL’s) would use 75% less energy, creating 75% less emissions.
In my view, incandescent light bulbs should soon become not legal-and-rare, but simply illegal. Freedom has to be tempered by responsibility. Fighting climate change is more important than being free to waste energy.
Most people would think we in Oregon use mostly clean hydro-power as our main source of electicity. But our State is only 44% hydro. Fossil fuels makes up about 50%. Renewables are about 1%. The rest is bio-mass based and nuclear.
http://www.oregonecology.com/2007/09/oregon-power-generation.html
I agree with the compact flouresccent light bulbs. I installed all compact flourescents a few years ago and my electricty bill dropped about 25%!