Alberta's last coal plant has powered down, marking the end of an era | In a feat once thought impossible, the province went from 80% coal power to zero — years ahead of schedule
Alberta's last coal plant has powered down, marking the end of an era | In a feat once thought impossible, the province went from 80% coal power to zero — years ahead of schedule
Seems good. Until you realize they just shifted to ‘Natural Gas’. Aka liquid methane, which in the short term traps heat 80 times worse than CO2 for about 20 years.
Those wasn’t a move to help the environment, just to make to oil barons richer.
To be fair, that’s only if it escapes. If you burn it, the reaction is CH4 + 2 O2 → CO2 + 2 H2O. Not saying it’s great and that some doesn’t escape but it’s definitely better than coal lol
Well pointed out. Too bad the emissions are higher than anyone connected with the industry is willing to admit.
https://thetyee.ca/News/2023/12/11/Alberta-Methane-Super-Emitter/#
Is it actually better than coal though? It takes very little methane leakage to be as damaging as coal. Methane is shitty and we really shouldn't celebrate any of its use.
Exactly this.
I mean, if I make the following point on his behalf, he might have a leg to stand on: by increasing methane dependence we increase the likelihood of a leak. However, it's pretty clear he's got an uniformed opinion or is just shooting from the hip.
I don't like switching to NG; they should have just bit the bullet and gone solar, wind, hydro, nuclear or some combination thereof. The decision to go to NG was likely both financially (cost of shuttering coal projects rather than converting) and economically (got to appease our oil and gas overlords somehow) motivated. Just look at the fucking renewables moratorium...
Also lmao at Notely accomplishing an objective years after the fact, while Kenney and Smith were too busy flipping pancakes at the stampede.
Natural gas is not a liquid, it's a gas. When burned it releases half the carbon that coal does and has far less other pollutants (impurities) that coal has. When it leaks yes it does have a bad chain reaction. (And in case anyone enjoy otherwise, yes I think we should have solar, wind and yes nuclear.)
They pipe it in liquid form, LNG.
And more leaks than they report.
This is true. Albeit, a little misleading as the vast majority of that gas will be converted to CO2 rather than released as methane, but this province wont ever do anything to help the environment as the only goal.
I'm happy to take the wins where I can. This is not the best choice, but it's still a positive change.
figured they had plenty of oil and “natural” gas to tide them over?
If only we weren't stuck with lots of toxic wankers here in Australia who genuinely are in love with coal
Good! They must have accelerated the trend quite a bit from when I could find data on their energy mix. But it does look like they're largely replacing with gas rather than renewables.
Preach!
The same story will be said about fossil fuels and animal agriculture.
funny, when half your country catches fire it really seems to galvanize people to support renewables. huh.