Saturday 21 November 2015

Green technologies ‘accelerating in US marketplace’

Green technologies ‘accelerating in US marketplace’

Clean energy technologies are accelerating in the US.

That’s according a to new report which was launched by Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz.

It shows a dramatic increase in deployment and a decrease in cost of four "transformational technologies": wind turbines, solar technologies, electric vehicles (EVs) and LEDs.

The report states between 2008 and 2014, onshore wind accounted for 31% of all new generation capacity installed in the US.

In 2014 more than 65,000MW of utility-scale wind energy was deployed  - enough to power more than 16 million homes - with another 13,600MW under construction in 2015.

It adds by 2014, more than 8GW of distributed solar PV was installed - enough to power around one million homes. Utility-scale solar grew by 68% in 2014 to 9.7GW in total. By mid-2015 there were 17 utility-scale projects with more than 100MW capacity, financed solely by the private sector.

The report went on: “Almost 80 million LED bulbs were installed in 2014 which is a six-fold increase since 2012.”

The installations prevented 7.1 million metric tons of carbon emissions and saved Americans $1.4 billion (£0.9bn) last year.

It adds the transportation sector makes up 27% of overall US carbon emissions. It said an average EV reduces greenhouse gas emissions by 48% and nearly 300,000 were sold through 2014 taking nearly 150,000 gasoline-powered cars off the road.

Mr Moniz said: “Today, clean energy technologies are providing real-world solutions – not only to reduce Carbon Dioxide emissions which cause global warming but they also drive a domestic, low carbon economy with technologies which are increasingly cost-competitive with conventional technologies.”

Written by

Bruna Pinhoni

Trending Articles