California
Back to mapTo get to zero by 2050, California must cut climate pollution by 16.2 million metric tons of C02 equivalent a year.
Emissions in California
Million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (MMTCO2e) emissions
We can do it. Here's how.
- Regenerative agriculture to sequester carbon in soil
- Composting to reduce landfill methane emissions
- New techniques for manufacturing CO2 emitting materials, like concrete
🏠 Buildings
10% of emissions in California comes from buildings.
Mostly from different types of heating.
80% of the pollution of your typical home comes from heating your space, water, and food.
To stop this pollution, we need to replace our furnaces with electric heat pumps, electrify our water heaters, and cook with induction and electricity instead of gas.
There are 11.5 million buildings in California and 28% of building systems are already electrified.
We need to electrify the remaining 8.3 million buildings in California. That's around 297,000 per year.
That will solve 10% of the problem.
🚗 Getting Around
49% of emissions in California comes from cars, trucks, and planes.
Mostly from our cars.
To cut this pollution, if you have a car, your next one needs to be an electric vehicle (EV).
Or try going car-free with public transit, bikes/e-bikes, or walking if it works for you.
There are 14.2 million vehicles in California and 425,000 are already electric (3% of the total).
We need to electrify the remaining 13.8 million vehicles. That's around 496,000 a year.
That will solve another 49% of the problem.
🔌 Power Generation
7% of emissions in California comes from making power.
Specifically from coal, gas, and oil plants.
To cut this pollution, we need to replace all dirty power plants with clean ones (mostly wind and solar).
In California we need to close and replace:
1 coal plant
Argus Cogen Plant
San Bernardino County
63 MW
293 gas plants
Moss Landing
Monterey County
3,102 MW
Haynes Generating Station
Los Angeles County
2,885 MW
AES Alamitos
Los Angeles County
2,055 MW
Scattergood Generating Station
Los Angeles County
1,719 MW
Ormond Beach Power, LLC.
Ventura County
1,612 MW
El Segundo
Los Angeles County
1,534 MW
AES Redondo Beach
Los Angeles County
1,316 MW
Valley Generating Station
Los Angeles County
1,236 MW
La Paloma Generating Plant
Kern County
1,200 MW
Mountainview Generating Station
San Bernardino County
1,167 MW
7 oil plants
Dynegy Oakland Power Plant
Alameda County
260 MW
McClure
Stanislaus County
142 MW
SC 1 Data Center, Phase 2
Santa Clara County
93 MW
Kings Beach
Placer County
31 MW
Phillips 66 Carbon Plant
Contra Costa County
27 MW
Pebbly Beach Generating Station Hybrid
Los Angeles County
13 MW
Regional Wastewater Control Facility
San Joaquin County
5 MW
...and help those workers find good jobs.
But wait! Remember how we electrified all cars and buildings?
Our machines don't pollute now, because they run on electricity!
But that means we need to make more power for those new electric machines - twice as much power as we make now!
And all of it needs to be clean power!
So to cut the climate pollution from our power, cars, and buildings we need to INSTALL 23,000 MWs of wind and 24,000 MWs of solar.
Since California already has 6,000 megawatts of solar power generation and 2,000 megawatts of wind power generation, that's 746 Megawatts of wind capacity AND 647 Megawatts of solar capacity a year we need to build.
That will solve another 7% of the problem.
🏭 Other Emissions
The last 34% of emissions in California comes other sources
This includes industry, landfills, and farming.
There's no one solution to solve these problems, but there are a lot of great ideas!
These include:
Learn how to electrify your own machines and pass local policy to electrify the rest
Take Action