{"id":13037,"date":"2015-03-09t08:15:56","date_gmt":"2015-03-09t08:15:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dpetrov.2create.studio\/planet\/wordpress\/natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables\/"},"modified":"2015-03-09t08:15:56","modified_gmt":"2015-03-09t08:15:56","slug":"natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables\/","title":{"rendered":"natural gas: a stop on the road to renewables"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\nwhen my parents decided to renovate our house to use natural gas, i remember how excited my mom was to get a new range. she was sick of how long it took for our 15-year-old electric coil stove to heat up, which prolonged everything from melting butter to boiling water.<\/p>\n<p>our house was an \u201call electric home,\u201d&nbsp;powered by connecticut light and power. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cl-p.com\/home\/aboutclp\/about_cl_p\/?menuid=4294984937\">cl&amp;p supplies their customers with energy through oil and nuclear technology<\/a>. at the time of our renovation we looked into installing solar panels on our roof, but <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dsireusa.org\/\">our state didn\u2019t offer an incentive<\/a>&nbsp;and we wouldn\u2019t see the return on investment as immediately as we did with propane. after making the switch, our monthly energy bill is one fifth of what is was before, our home heats and cools more efficiently, and sometimes the butter on the stove melts too fast.<\/p>\n<h2>less carbon, less harm<\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\">the word \u201c<\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.epa.gov\/climatechange\/ghgemissions\/gases\/co2.html\" style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\">carbon dioxide<\/a><span style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\">\u201d is tossed around by scientists, journalists&nbsp;and citizens a lot; it comes with a negative association \u2014 at least for many. carbon dioxide is the world\u2019s most prevalent <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.epa.gov\/climatechange\/ghgemissions\/gases.html\" style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\">greenhouse gas<\/a><span style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\">. many don\u2019t know that it is a necessary component of the earth\u2019s atmosphere and that it has only become threatening over the past few decades. the concentration of co<\/span>2<span style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\"> in our atmosphere has <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.esrl.noaa.gov\/gmd\/webdata\/ccgg\/trends\/co2_data_mlo.png\" style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\">risen exponentially<\/a><span style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\"> due to human activities like the burning of coal for electricity and fossil fuels in our cars; the excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is contributing to anthropogenic climate change. atmospheric carbon dioxide is measured in parts per million (<\/span>ppm<span style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\">), and over the past 50 years the concentration of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere has gone from <\/span>320ppm<span style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\"> to almost <\/span>400ppm<span style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\">.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>the <strong>burning of coal produces two times more carbon dioxide than the burning of natural gas<\/strong>. <a href=\"http:\/\/350.org\/about\/science\/\">we are approaching a tipping point of 450ppm<\/a>, where the amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide will be too great for mitigation efforts to actually reverse the effects of climate change. so with our planet\u2019s future weighing in the balance, is natural gas the bridge to renewable energy?<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\">by 2040, natural gas will make <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.eia.gov\/forecasts\/aeo\/er\/early_production.cfm\" style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\">up 38 percent&nbsp;of u.s. energy production<\/a><span style=\"line-height: 1.6em;\">. coal production in the us is slowing, and while the development and use of domestic natural gas resources is reducing carbon dioxide emissions, natural gas production and distribution does come with its own environmental concerns.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2>a temporary solution<\/h2>\n<p>the process of getting natural gas, trapped in between the layers of rock, can be harmful to the environment if not done carefully. <a href=\"http:\/\/www2.epa.gov\/hydraulicfracturing\/process-hydraulic-fracturing\">hydraulic fracturing<\/a>&nbsp;&#8220;produces fractures in the rock formation that stimulate the flow of natural gas or oil,&nbsp;increasing the volumes that can be recovered. wells may be drilled vertically hundreds to thousands of feet below the land surface and may include horizontal or directional sections extending thousands of feet.&#8221;&nbsp;methane flaring and water contamination are two environmental concerns related to hydrofracking; this reality cannot be ignored, even though natural gas is a cleaner burning fuel.<\/p>\n<p>so while my family didn\u2019t go the extra step and invest in renewable energy technology, that\u2019s where the united state\u2019s energy future needs to head. we need to move in the direction of renewable energy technologies like solar, wind, and geothermal. these technologies produce energy without emitting carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases and can help reduce and eliminate the threat human activities pose to our planet.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>natural gas is huge right now, but it&#8217;s meant to be a bridge fuel to renewables, not a total solution to our energy needs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9198,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4917,4903],"tags":[3416,532],"storyfest_categories":[],"class_list":["post-13037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy","category-natural-gas","tag-bridge-fuel","tag-natural-gas"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- this site is optimized with the yoast seo plugin v24.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>natural gas: a stop on the road to renewables - planet forward<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_us\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"natural gas: a stop on the road to renewables - planet forward\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"natural gas is huge right now, but it&#039;s meant to be a bridge fuel to renewables, not a total solution to our energy needs.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"planet forward\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/planetforward.org\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-03-09t08:15:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"lauren pollack\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@planet_forward\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@planet_forward\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"lauren pollack\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"article\",\"@id\":\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables\/#article\",\"ispartof\":{\"@id\":\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"lauren pollack\",\"@id\":\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/#\/schema\/person\/ec5db03cea0c9111c4db6ac8ce69f7a8\"},\"headline\":\"natural gas: a stop on the road to renewables\",\"datepublished\":\"2015-03-09t08:15:56+00:00\",\"datemodified\":\"2015-03-09t08:15:56+00:00\",\"mainentityofpage\":{\"@id\":\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables\/\"},\"wordcount\":582,\"commentcount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"bridge fuel\",\"natural gas\"],\"articlesection\":[\"energy\",\"natural gas\"],\"inlanguage\":\"en-us\",\"potentialaction\":[{\"@type\":\"commentaction\",\"name\":\"comment\",\"target\":[\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"webpage\",\"@id\":\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables\/\",\"url\":\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables\/\",\"name\":\"natural gas: a stop on the road to renewables - planet forward\",\"ispartof\":{\"@id\":\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/#website\"},\"datepublished\":\"2015-03-09t08:15:56+00:00\",\"datemodified\":\"2015-03-09t08:15:56+00:00\",\"inlanguage\":\"en-us\",\"potentialaction\":[{\"@type\":\"readaction\",\"target\":[\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/natural-gas-a-stop-on-the-road-to-renewables\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"website\",\"@id\":\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/\",\"name\":\"planet forward\",\"description\":\"inspiring stories to 2022年卡塔尔世界杯官网
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