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Five States Stepping Up On Clean Energy | Earth Wise

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While Congress continues to face partisan gridlock on climate issues, many states have moved forward with climate action.

In 2021, five states – Illinois, Massachusetts, Oregon, North Carolina, and Rhode Island – passed laws requiring a shift to 100% carbon-free electricity or net-zero emissions.  Washington State passed a law that helps to implement its strong 2019 and 2020 climate and clean energy laws.  Washington’s new legislation establishes a carbon trading program that will help the state to meet its goals of economy-wide emission cuts and 100% carbon-free electricity.

Several other states made progress on climate and clean energy by taking targeted actions not quite as aggressive as 100% laws, but significant, nonetheless.

The five states that entered the so-called 100% club joined with the six states that had earlier passed such legislation.  Those are California, Hawaii, New Mexico, New York, Virginia, and Washington.  Both Puerto Rico and Washington D.C. are also members of the club.

The past year may well be the biggest year yet for significant clean energy legislation.  Some of the states that finally passed laws had been gearing up for it for years.  This is particularly true of Massachusetts and Illinois.

Actions by individual states are not an antidote to inaction by the federal government, but they help.  At this point, about one-third of the country’s population lives in states that have laws requiring a transition to 100% carbon-free electricity, 100% renewable electricity, or net-zero emissions. 

All of this activity began in 2015, when Hawaii passed its renewable energy law.

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Inside Clean Energy: Here Are 5 States that Took Leaps on Clean Energy Policy in 2021

Photo, posted August 12, 2021, courtesy of Glacier NPS via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Two Million Solar Installations

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Three years ago, we reported that the United States had installed its one millionth solar energy system, a feat that took 40 years to accomplish.  Recently, the Solar Energy Industries Association announced that there are now more than 2 million U.S. installations.

Analysts forecast that there will be 3 million installation in 2021 and 4 million in 2023.

California continues to lead the nation in installing solar power.  More than 50% of the first million installations were in that state and California accounted for 43% of the second million.  Its share is nevertheless slowly dropping with the growth of the residential solar sector that is rapidly diversifying across state markets.  Some places have seen extremely rapid growth.  In South Carolina, there were barely more than 1,000 cumulative installations in 2016; today, the state is home to more than 18,000 solar systems and expects to add 22,000 more over the next five years.

The five leading states in terms of number of solar installations are California, Arizona, New York, New Jersey, and Massachusetts.    Other states recently seeing rapid growth in solar installations are Texas, Utah, Florida, Rhode Island and Maryland.  Looking ahead, Illinois is forecast to grow from only 4,000 installations today to nearly 100,000 by 2024.  The top ten state markets apart from California expect to add nearly 750,000 installation over the next five years.

The United States is at least the third nation that is home to more than 2 million solar installations.  (Australia hit the milestone late least year and Japan actually topped 2 million in September 2014).

According to forecasts from analyst first Wood Mackenzie, by the year 2024, there will be on average one new solar installation every minute.

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The United States surpasses 2 million solar installations

Photo, posted January 11, 2012, courtesy of the Oregon Department of Transportation via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Hybrid-Electric Aircraft

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The commercial aviation industry is a major source of carbon dioxide emissions and, as other industries try to move towards decarbonization, its share is getting larger.  But reducing emissions from aircraft is challenging because powering planes without burning fossil fuel is hard to do.

The biggest problem is that powering aircraft with electric motors instead of fossil fuel motors requires so much energy that the batteries needed to supply it become impractically heavy.  While research goes on to develop lighter-weight batteries, an interim concept may pay dividends.

Just as hybrid cars represent a stepping stone towards full electrification, hybrid-electric aircraft may be a way to obtain substantial reductions in aircraft emissions.  The idea is to use battery-powered electric motors to power planes, but to greatly reduce the capacity requirements of the batteries by having an on-board fossil-fuel generator to charge the batteries and supply additional needed power.

A study by the University of Illinois looked at the potential emissions reductions for hybrid-electric aircraft taking into account the emissions associated with generating the electricity that charges the batteries in the plane.  The requirements in the study were that the plane needs to be able to carry the same number of passengers and travel the same distance as current aircraft. 

The results were that a drivetrain that gets 50% of its power from battery charge reduced emissions by about 50% over the full lifecycle of the plane.

As batteries get lighter and the electric grid gets greener, the possibility of making major reductions in aircraft carbon emissions looks increasingly realistic.  But there is a long way to go.

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Study Examines Commercial Hybrid-Electric Aircraft, Reduced Carbon Emissions

Photo, posted September 26, 2014, courtesy of Jeff Turner via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

A Quiet Clean Energy Revolution

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While the Trump administration seeks to prop up and promote use of fossil fuels, the country continues to move in the opposite direction.  Last year was actually a pretty positive year for clean energy in the U.S.

In terms of public opinion, 70% of Americans surveyed believe the country should produce 100% of its electricity from renewable energy sources and more than half of survey respondents think renewables are a good idea even if they raise energy bills.

Companies in the U.S. purchased a record 6.43 gigawatts of renewable power, enough to power 1.5 million homes.  The number of corporations entering into renewable energy deals doubled last year.

More than 300 U.S. cities, towns or counties have made commitments to climate action and, as of November, 99 cities have committed to 100% renewable energy, doubling the total from a year ago.

A number of gubernatorial candidates running on ambitious renewable energy platforms were elected in November including those in Illinois, Colorado, New Mexico, Maine and Nevada.

Utilities are responding to the growing demand for clean energy.  Consumers Energy in Michigan plans to cut carbon emissions by 80% and stop using coal.  Iowa-based MidAmerican Energy will become the first U.S. utility to source 100% of its electricity from renewable sources next year.  Xcel Energy, one of the biggest utilities in the country, has committed to be 80% carbon-free by 2030 and go completely carbon-free by 2050.

The fossil fuel industry with its supporters in high places is still kicking and screaming, but there is no doubt that the U.S. energy system is changing, and the quiet clean energy revolution will only pick up more steam in 2019.

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The US Underwent a Quiet Clean Energy Revolution Last Year

Photo, posted August 15, 2009, courtesy of Ken via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Hacking Photosynthesis

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There is an enzyme known as RuBisCo that is involved in carbon fixation, the process plants use to convert carbon dioxide into sugar molecules.  The RuBisCo molecule is inside the leaves of most plants and is probably the most abundant protein in the world.

RuBisCo picks up carbon dioxide from the air and uses energy from the sun to turn the carbon into sugar molecules.  This process of photosynthesis is pretty much the foundation of life on Earth.

Wonderful as it is, the process is not perfect.  RuBisCo is not very selective in grabbing molecules from the air.  It picks up oxygen as well as CO2 and it produces a toxic compound when it does that.

Plants operate a whole other complicated chemical process to deal with this toxic byproduct and uses up a lot of energy along the way, leaving less energy for making leaves or food that we can eat.

A research program at the University of Illinois called Realizing Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (or RIPE) has been trying to correct this problem; they have been trying to hack photosynthesis.  And they may well have succeeded.

Using genetic modification on tobacco plants, they have shut down the existing detoxification process and set up a much more efficient new one.  The result is super plants that grow faster and up to 40% bigger.

The next step is to get it to work on plants that people actually rely upon for food, like tomatoes, soybeans and black-eyed peas (which are a staple food crop in sub-Saharan Africa where food is scarce.)

It will be years before we know if the process can really produce more food and be safe, but it may end up leading to a major increase in crop productivity.

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Scientists Have ‘Hacked Photosynthesis’ In Search Of More Productive Crops

Photo, posted June 10, 2013, courtesy of Boon Hong Seto via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Small Grains In Corn Country

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Large portions of the Midwest are called the Corn Belt and for good reason.  Overall, about 90 million acres or 140,000 square miles of the United States are planted with corn and about half of that is in Iowa, Illinois, Nebraska and Minnesota.  In most of the Corn Belt, the corn is planted in rotation with soybeans.  Both are warm weather crops and the soil is left barren for nearly half of the year when the two crops are out of season.

[Read more…] about Small Grains In Corn Country

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