[Gravey]

I think you’ve made some valid points in your previous post, but I’m not sure I buy this as a valid argument.

A quick google search tells me that 30.1% of US energy generation comes from coal [1] (at least in 2017), with 62.7% coming from fossil fuels overall.

Unless you’re proposing switching to a ‘cleaner’ fossil fuel source, there’s only so much wind/solar/geothermal can contribute until we see major leaps in the available technologies. Until that time I will continue to view them as a supplemental power source, rather than a primary one.

[1]https://toxmap.nlm.nih.gov/toxmap/faq/2009/08/how-much-of-th...

[ErrantX]

Just on your specific point; the US is a bit of an outlier on coal due to protectionist practices around the coal industry.

If you look at Europe on the other hand coal is in rapid decline (9% decrease 2017-2018 for example[1]) with many countries now being coal free.

In the UK we measure coal free time in weeks now. I expect us to be coal free for good in only a couple of years.

In some countries this is a straight switch to renewables but but often I think it's a staged switch through natural gas.

1. https://sandbag.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/The-Europe...

[durandal1]

On the other hand look at Germany, who has arguable gone the furthest in the "green transition", which includes shutting down their nuclear power plats. It imports 60+% of its energy, most of it from fossil fuel sources.

But hey, German energy production looks awesome from an environmental perspective!

[svara]

That's totally false, where did you get this from? Germany is a net exporter of electricity [0]. Nuclear is being phased out and replaced by renewables. [1] Yes, that totally sucks for CO_2 emissions...

[0] https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/153533/umfrag...

[1] https://i2.wp.com/adveco.co/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/EU-po...

[ErrantX]

That was mostly a (slightly wierd) knee jerk after Fukushima. They are definitely another outlier.