Northwest Bioregion and Climate Change

Last week I referenced an article discussing coal production – this article is about the sectors of coal consumption, as reported by the EIA.

The Pacific Northwest only consumes 1% of the United States electric coal consumption (or coal used to generate electricity)…as most of the Pacific Northwest’s power is generated through hydroelectricity.  The largest areas of coal consumption (to generate electricity) occurs in the East North Central (23%) and South Atlantic (18%).  Coal consumption related to electricity generation is roughly 93% of total US coal consumption…so this graph shows where almost all the coal is consumed.

Of these regions, 5 of them have over 50% of their power generated from coal (E North Central, W North Central, South Atlantic, E South Central and Mountain).  Because of the high correlation, folks assume that more electricity is required to stimulate economic growth (as power/coal consumption is HIGHLY correlated to gross domestic product).  The mindset needs to change towards a model of economic growth through efficiencies (using less energy), or renewable power.  A sustainable long term perspective is to adopt a model of growth in GDP without increasing power production.