How does energy conservation help save the environment?

5 Responses

1. The generation of electricity is harmful to the environment (at least the main way of creating it is). It releases smoke into the atmosphere, which generates many negative effects. So if energy is conserved, this process is not performed as much, and there is less pollution.

2. Less stress on the grid. Use your bicycle to get to work, instead of your car, you get less emissions.

   On the other hand energy conservation isn’t the silver bullet or the magic answer. That’s just prolonging the inevitable collapse of ecosystems because of our over use of non renewable fossil fuels.

3. Energy conservation helps out the environment a lot. It can help stop global warming. Using less gas from cars can help. The global warming caused from all of the bad gasses and pollution we are making makes the ozone layer have a big “gap”. That big gap allows a lot more sun light and that can cause more skin cancer. Using less paper helps also. Use both front and back of the paper. The manufacturers use less chemicals to make the paper white, cut down less trees, and paper not used stuck in a garbage can could go in a landfill. What about all of that beautiful scenery such as the Grand Canyon. What if we put trash that we could reuse down there? That is why we need to conserve energy to help save the Earth. Start helping now!

4. Coal power plants release much carbon dioxide and other noxious gases and also mercury into the air. As this floats, it eventually settles on the ground and rivers and streams nearby, which flow to the lakes and the ocean. If you or someone you know likes to fish, they are most likely injesting a small amount of mercury with each fish. This cannot be avoided. But it could be avoided if we shut down all coal power plants and converted 100% to solar and wind power.

   Since we, as the general public, cannot force these plants to shut down, we can, however, at least limit our electrical use to as little as possible, leaving lights off during the day, not using a night light at night but going by the light of the moon or street light, candles, etc. Always turn lights off when you leave the room and always leave your appliances, such as the omputer, television, etc, unplugged when not in use. These drain a small amount of elctricity through the cord even if not turned on and this small amount of drain is at a constant rate and adds up day after day. If all households did this, can you imagine the impact we could have on the environment?? How much fresher the air would be?

   And you fail to see the connection. I have seen this same question on here so many times in this week alone. And I really wonder how people cannot see the connection when it is so obvious.

5. Energy use by humans has huge negative impacts on the environment:
   – When we burn fossil fuels like coal, natural gas, and oil, we release carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere. CO2 is a greenhouse gas, which means that it traps heat from the sun inside the earth’s atmosphere. Ever increasing levels of greenhouse gases over the last two hundred years have resulted in a steady warming of the climate. This climate change is already wiping out species, and scientists predict that between 10% and 50% of animal species worldwide could be wiped out by climate change within 50 years. Climate change is also causing massive melting of glaciers and polar ice caps, which could cause sea levels to rise by several meters, so places like Florida and New York City will be half under water. As well climate change is shifting rainfall patterns, which are already causing increased flooding in some areas, and increased drought in others. Neither is good for agriculture, so feeding the world’s ever increasing population is more and more a challenge.
   – As another answerer pointed out, burning coal releases mercury into the atmosphere. Mercury is very toxic in small doses. Coal is one of the biggest energy sources, as it’s used to produce much of the electricity in big energy using countries such as China, the US and Australia.
   – Even hydroelectric power has costs. Hydroelectric dams require the flooding of large areas of land, destroying habitat. Dams may block the migration of river-spawning fish who can’t get around the dam barriers to lay their eggs. Dead trees left under water in the reservoirs contain trace amounts of mercury (like coal, since coal comes from fossilized fern trees), which in flooded areas leaches out into the water supply, contaminating fish and making them unsafe for humans to eat.
   – Oil and natural gas extraction is hugely damaging to the areas of the planet where it’s practiced. Just look at the oil tar sands projects in Alberta, Canada, where vast areas of land are being dug up, steam injected into the tarry sands to extract the oil, and the contaminated waste water being dumped in massive containment ponds. Birds landing in these ponds get coated in toxic oily sludge and often die within days.

   Some forms of energy are less harmful. Solar energy, for instance, can be captured and converted to heat for a home, with very few negative impacts. It can be converted to electricity as well. Wind energy can generate electricity, and small-scale hydroelectric projects are one way of converting falling water into energy without doing much harm to the environment.

   Since energy production is so often harmful to the environment, it follows that everything we can do to save energy will reduce that harm. Even if a particular house is getting its electricity from ‘green’ sources like solar, wind, or small-scale hydro, on a power grid like North America’s, a kilowatt-hour saved by such a house means a kilowatt hour of green energy that can be used somewhere else (such as in a house a few miles away where the electricity normally comes from dirty sources).

   Here are some impacts I’ve come up with to show the impacts of energy conservation on saving our environment:

   – If every household in North America changed one more incandescent to a CFL in a high-use fixture, we might reduce our emissions by several million tons of CO2 per year.
   – If one in six Americans lowered their hot water heater temperature by a few degrees to a safer temperature, we could save 150,000 ton of CO2 emissions.
   – If one in 100 Americans got rid of that old, inefficient beer fridge in the basement, we could save half a million pounds of CO2 emissions.

   I have lots of tips on energy conservation on my energy saving website, and the link cited below is where I got my energy saving facts.