Two vast worldwide programs would do the most to reduce climate warming: (1) constructing nuclear power plants; and (2) ending leaks of methane.
I do not mean to imply that these actions are politically likely or cost free. As I have already indicated on this site, we have not, by and large, been motivated to act.
Only nuclear power can fill in when the wind isn’t blowing, or when the sun isn’t shining, or when there isn’t room for wind turbines or solar collectors, or to eliminate the CO2 from manufacturing batteries. Moreover, it has by far the lowest emissions per kilowatt hour of electricity. See the table below.
Solar and wind. power are better choices than doing nothing, except that they take resources that could go to build nuclear power plants.
Methane emissions, and rogue emissions of banned chloro- and fluoro- hydrocarbons are major causes of rising temperatures. We can do much more to rein them it, for example by caping old oil and gas wells and enforcing best practices on new ones, and by eliminating gas appliances, or at least tightening standards for them.
We can remove the political restrictions on much cheaper Asian electric cars.
We can license only combined cycle gas new fossil fuel power plants when fossil fuel electricity is necessary, and finish using electricity from coal and oil.
We can greatly raise taxes on gasoline (petrol) and diesel, or institute a carbon tax.
Fossil Fuel Savings from Nuclear, Wind and Solar power.
In the table that follows, I show the CO2 savings from nuclear, wind and solar power, based upon the calculations in the following three pages. For fossil fuel CO2 emissions I use a natural gas in a combined cycle power plant — the lowest emitting fossil fuel system — at 330 grams of CO2 per kilowatt hour, assuming that coal, oil, and single cycle gas power plants will be phased out. (If I used 400 grams it would increase the savings percent slightly , but also increase the remaining emissions by a much larger amount.)
I have not included costs in the table that follows, primarily, because this Internet Site is about climate, If we want to slow climate warming, we must be willing, if necessary, to pay a somewhat higher price for energy. Furthermore, cost is dependent on regulations, construction time, and interest rates. Nuclear facilities, for example, cost very little over the long run, but can be the most expensive to finance. A superlative article on cost is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source.
Here are my results:
| ENERGY SOURCE | CO2 REDUCTION | AREA COVERED square meters per 100,000 megawatt hours, over lifetime of sourse |
|
|---|---|---|---|
| Nuclear | 98% | 920 | |
| New wind offshore in best locations | 29% to 35% depending on constancy of wind | 240,000 to 1,160,000 | |
| Solar, no storage, USA Southwest, southern Spain, two-way grid connection | 32% | 8,400 | |
| Solar panels, no storage, eastern USA or northern Europe with two-way grid connection | 20% | 19,000 | |
| Solar thermal, 24 hour storage, USA Southwest. southern Spain | 51% or more | 57,000 | |
| Solar panels, 24 hour storage, best locations, with two-way grid connection | 59% | estimated 20,000 | |
| Solar panels, 24 hour storage, eastern USA or northern Europe, with two-way grid connection | ~50% | estimated 58,000 |
|
| Reduce all solar savings by 20% if grid conection is only incoming and system is not sized for summer and winter. |