In our generation today, technology has become the most essential necessity. This is why electricity is vital to have in every home. Electricity is what drives our world and connects people all over the globe. Although, electricity is a clean and relatively safe form of energy when it is used, and how it is generated is what affects our air quality. In 2018, 65% of the total electricity generated in the United States was produced from fossil fuels (coal, natural gas, and petroleum), in addition, materials that come from plants, municipal and industrial wastes. When the power plants burn the fossil fuels and the wastes, they release emissions in the air which contains (Carbon dioxide CO2, Carbon Monoxide CO, Sulfur Dioxide SO2, Nitrogen Oxide NOx, Particulate matter PM, Heavy metals such as mercury).
In this research, I worked on two data sets of electricity generated with different sources and the emissions from 1990 until 2018.
This graph is showing the electricity in million Megawatthouhs produced from non-clean sources (fossil fuels), clean sources (Hydroelectric Conventional, Nuclear, Pumped Storage, Solar, Wind), and the curve of the emissions from 1990 to 2018.
This graph is showing the total emissions from 1990 to 2018 by states. As shown the state of Texas is ahead from all the states in emissions.
This graph is showing the production of electricity using different sources vs. emissions. Starting from 2014 to 2018 the graph is showing a slite drop in emissions when the state produced more electricity using clean sources.
Closely looking at the 2018 data to check all the sources used to produce electricity in Texas. As shown in the graph the state of Texas produces most of the electricity from natural gas, coal, and wind. Clearly, we can see natural gas and coal mostly are the source of high emissions.
Compared to Texas, California has more population and produces less electricity. Also, looking at the graph the state of California has fewer emissions.
We can see here, California uses a variety of cleaner sources rather than non-clean sources, especially coal. Coal is known to be the most harmful, and in the graph, we see California uses almost zero of the coal.