OC among nation’s top producers of greenhouse gases
April 17th, 2008, 3:00 am · 3 Comments · posted by grobbins
Orange County ranks 47th among 3,141 counties nationwide in releasing the key greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (C02) into the atmosphere, says a new study by Purdue University.
The county produced 4.71 million tons of C02 in 2002, the last year for which comprehensive data was available from the Environmental Protection Agency when Purdue began its study. About 74 percent of the C02 was released by cars, trucks and other vehicles, researchers say.
The top three producers of C02: Harris County, Texas, where Houston is located, with 18.62 million tons; Los Angeles County, with 18.59 million tons; and Cook County, Illinois, where Chicago is located, with 13.20 million tons.
“The study means that there are lots of opportunities to lower emissions,” says Purdue atmospheric scientist Kevin Gurney, one of the study’s lead authors. “Things like hybrid cars, using ethanol fuel and riding bikes.”
Gurney also was a lead author of a study that illustrated how tons of air pollution from Orange County and the rest of Southern California flows into Mexico during the summer months. (Read our story on that report.)
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April 17th, 2008 at 8:08 am
Study after study shows that Carbon Dioxide levels follow surface temperature fluxuations. For you enviro-pagans, this means Carbon Dioxide does not raise temperatures. Carbon Dioxide is not a bad thing, in fact it is necessary for our very existance. Study after study shows that Carbon Dioxide levels, over the years, are unchanged. Which is worse, a gullable public, or an irresponible media that fails or refuses to present both sides of the global warming issues? This is a massive hoax being played out and people are truly stupid if they continue to believe this fraud. Global Warming/cooling is natural and will continue regardless of the enviro-pagan shrill. In case you didn’t know, we are all Carbon based life forms. We need to make as big a Carbon footprint as possible.
April 17th, 2008 at 10:28 am
Why do they always sound like the good old U.S.A . is the root of the worlds problem? They talk about greenhouse gases and produce a list of the top offenders like its the F.B.I most wanted, they want open borders, open trade with all countries, more taxes on everything, then they cry when this country stands to profit, and after all these bone heads get their way and make their great ideas law they will cry even louder when their world takes a dive. This country comes first the heck with everybody else. The couple of hundred men left in this country need to set these people straight now weather they like it or not.
May 6th, 2008 at 11:13 pm
The numbers in this article seem off by a factor. Looking up the table in the Purdue Vulcan study gives 4.71 million metric tons of carbon for OC, not CO2. Converting to CO2 from C uses the atomic weight ratio of 44/12 = 3.67, and that 1 metric ton = 1.1 ton. This gives 19 million tons of CO2 for 3 million OC residents, or about 6.3 tons per resident.
This is at odds with a standard figure of 15 tons of CO2 per OC resident.
It is also hard to see why Orange County is so bad, since the US average per capita is 20 tons of CO2 per capita.
First of all, we have a mild climate requiring less winter heating than
in the east. Second, we get very little electricity from coal, whereas the
US on average gets 50% of its electricity from coal, and coal is twice
as CO2 polluting as natural gas. Third, SC Edison gets 38% of its
electricity pollution free from renewables and nuclear power.