New York
Back to mapTo get to zero by 2050, New York must cut climate pollution by 7.3 million metric tons of C02 equivalent a year.
Emissions in New York
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
30% of emissions in New York 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 5.0 million buildings in New York and 19% of building systems are already electrified.
We need to electrify the remaining 4.0 million buildings in New York. That's around 144,000 per year.
That will solve 30% of the problem.
🚗 Getting Around
38% of emissions in New York 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 4.2 million vehicles in New York and 33,000 are already electric (0.8% of the total).
We need to electrify the remaining 4.2 million vehicles. That's around 151,000 a year.
That will solve another 38% of the problem.
🔌 Power Generation
12% of emissions in New York 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 New York we need to close and replace:
2 coal plants
Somerset Operating Company (Kintigh)
Niagara County
655 MW
Cayuga Operating Company, LLC
Tompkins County
323 MW
94 gas plants
Ravenswood Generating Station
Queens County
2,957 MW
Bowline Generating Station
Rockland County
1,992 MW
Northport
Suffolk County
1,564 MW
Astoria Generating Station
Queens County
1,345 MW
Bethlehem Energy Center (Albany)
Albany County
1,293 MW
Astoria Energy
Queens County
1,245 MW
Athens Generating Company
Greene County
1,222 MW
Independence
Oswego County
1,086 MW
Arthur Kill
Richmond County
896 MW
Valley Energy Center
Orange County
770 MW
55 oil plants
Oswego Harbor Power
Oswego County
1,896 MW
Roseton Generating LLC
Orange County
1,242 MW
Gowanus Generating Station
Kings County
733 MW
Holtsville Facility
Suffolk County
567 MW
Glenwood
Nassau County
338 MW
Wading River Facility
Suffolk County
239 MW
Hudson Avenue
Kings County
109 MW
Shoreham Energy
Suffolk County
100 MW
Shoreham
Suffolk County
72 MW
Jamaica Bay Peaking
Queens County
61 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 16,000 MWs of wind and 13,000 MWs of solar.
Since New York already has 448 megawatts of solar power generation and 501 megawatts of wind power generation, that's 549 Megawatts of wind capacity AND 450 Megawatts of solar capacity a year we need to build.
That will solve another 12% of the problem.
🏭 Other Emissions
The last 21% of emissions in New York 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