Both at the personal level as well as in the energy discourse, we sometimes select a role model based more on his glibness of talk rather than on his actions.
This post here is an effort to focus on results rather than on PR respecting the carbon intensity of electrical grids in selected countries.
All graphs shown below correspond to the latest IEA Monthly Electricity Survey. The first six months of 2014 are now finalized and shown here. A link to the full report can be found at the bottom of this page.
We will be listing the selected countries from the "best" to the "worst" based on the percentage of their electricity generated with combustible fuels.
1. Norway: 2%
2. Switzerland: 4%
3. France: 6%
4. Sweden: 9%
5. Canada: 22%
6. Spain: 33%
7. Finland: 42%
Note: now come the countries in which combustible fuels exceed 50% of their generated electricity.
8. Denmark: 56%
9. Germany: 63%
10. USA: 68%
11. UK: 68%
Next are the countries that are hovering close to 90% of combustible fuels in their electricity generation.
12. Australia: 87%
13. The Netherlands: 90%
14. Japan: 90% (in 2010 they were at 63%, big step backwards).
Thank you. Feel free to add to the conversation on Twitter: @luisbaram
Full IEA Report (click on June 2014).
http://www.iea.org/statistics/relatedsurveys/monthlyelectricitysurvey/
Denmark's numbers are slightly misleading since it imports approx 11TWH (exports a bit less) and some is from Germany and Sweden both of whom also produce electricity with nuclear.
ReplyDeleteBut the boosters only ever talk about how much wind they produce and how clean they are and never the other side of the ledger.
Pretty typical in this area because the whole picture is not sunbeams and unicorns, it's usually much messier and wind alone won't fix that, as we know.