New Website by the Council for Responsible Energy
A new website is now available that will help consumers be educated as well as build awareness of Natural Gas as the most responsible energy choice. Consumers, builders and businesses can save energy, reduce emissions and help protect the environment without compromising performance or lifestyle by choosing Natural Gas. Soon the website will offer a way to calculate your carbon footprint as well as offer fact sheets on the benefits of Natural Gas. Please visit the Council for Responsible Energy Consumer Website.
Natural Gas:
It's the Environmental Choice!
Natural Gas is the Cleanest as well as the Most Efficient Fossil Fuel.
Natural gas, the world's cleanest fossil fuel, is a highly efficient form of energy. It is made mostly of methane; the simple chemical composition of natural gas is a molecule of one carbon atom and four hydrogen atoms (CH4). When the methane compund is burned completely, the products of combustion are mainly carbon dioxide and water vapor.
Natural gas has fewer impurities, is chemically less complex and its combustion typically results in less pollution than other fuels. In most applications, the use of natural gas also produces less sulfur dioxide (a cause for acid rain), less nitrogen oxides (a cause for smog) and less particulate matter (which affects health and visibility) than oil or coal. Technological progress allows cleaner energy production today than in the past for all fuels, although the inherent cleanliness of gas means that environmental controls on gas equipment, if any are required, tend to be far less expensive than controls for other fuels.
Comparison of Air Pollution From Fossil Fuels
(Pounds of air pollutants produced per billion Btu of energy)
| Pollutant |
Natural Gas |
Oil |
Coal |
| Carbon Dioxide |
117,000 |
164,000 |
208,000 |
Source: Energy Information Administration
Using more natural gas to replace dirtier fuels can help address simultaneously a number of environmental concerns, like smog, acid rain and greenhouse gas emissions.
Natural gas is highly efficient. About 90 percent of the natural gas produced is delivered to customers as useful energy. In contrast, only about 27 percent of the energy converted to electricity reaches consumers.
New technologies have greatly reduced the number and size of areas disturbed by drilling for natural gas, sometimes called "footprints." Satellites, global positioning systems, remote sensing devices, and 3-D and 4-D seismic technologies, make it possible to discover natural gas reserves while drilling fewer wells. Plus, the use of horizontal and directional drilling make it possible for a single well to produce natural gas from much bigger areas than in the past.
Serving alternative fuel vehicles (AFVs), natural gas is clean burning and produces significantly fewer harmful emissions than reformulated gasoline. Natural gas can either be stored on board a vehicle in tanks as compressed natural gas (CNG) or cryogenically cooled to a liquid state, liquefied natural gas (LNG).
In 2006, the Department's Office of Fossil Energy began the Low-Impact Natural Gas and Oil (LINGO) initiative that integrates current technologies and practices in ways that minimize adverse environmental impacts from recovery of oil and gas over the life of the projects. The initiative also seeks to boost the economic recovery of oil and gas by addressing the environmental concerns that block such recovery. LINGO seeks to demonstrate that ultra-low impact technologies and practices can be deployed in environmentally-sensitive onshore areas without environmental harm. In time, this can bolster the public's confidence that oil and gas development can proceed in these areas without adverse effects to ecosystems.
Working with state and federal regulators and the oil and gas industry, the Department of Energy's Office of Fossil Energy is helping to ensure that approaches to environmental protection make technical, environmental, and economic sense. The program pursues improvements in regulatory decision making, supports development of new technologies, and helps promote energy policies that encourage more efficient and environmentally responsible oil and gas production.
Please visit the City of Toccoa Green Pages for more information on being "green" in our community.
