Utah
Back to mapTo get to zero by 2050, Utah must cut climate pollution by 2.5 million metric tons of C02 equivalent a year.
Emissions in Utah
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
9% of emissions in Utah 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 1.1 million buildings in Utah and 21% of building systems are already electrified.
We need to electrify the remaining 859,000 buildings in Utah. That's around 31,000 per year.
That will solve 9% of the problem.
🚗 Getting Around
26% of emissions in Utah 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 903,000 vehicles in Utah and 11,000 are already electric (1.2% of the total).
We need to electrify the remaining 891,000 vehicles. That's around 32,000 a year.
That will solve another 26% of the problem.
🔌 Power Generation
39% of emissions in Utah 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 Utah we need to close and replace:
5 coal plants
Intermountain
Millard County
2,480 MW
Hunter
Emery County
1,577 MW
Huntington
Emery County
1,037 MW
Bonanza
Uintah County
610 MW
Sunnyside Cogen Associates
Carbon County
58 MW
21 gas plants
Lake Side Power Plant
Utah County
1,385 MW
Currant Creek Power Project
Juab County
649 MW
Gadsby
Salt Lake County
492 MW
West Valley Power Plant
Salt Lake County
217 MW
Nebo Power Station
Utah County
140 MW
Millcreek Power
Washington County
80 MW
US Magnesium
Tooele County
78 MW
Bountiful City
Davis County
44 MW
Murray Turbine
Salt Lake County
42 MW
Whitehead
Utah County
31 MW
1 oil plant
St George Red Rock
Washington County
14 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 4,000 MWs of wind and 4,000 MWs of solar.
Since Utah already has 471 megawatts of solar power generation and 94 megawatts of wind power generation, that's 146 Megawatts of wind capacity AND 136 Megawatts of solar capacity a year we need to build.
That will solve another 39% of the problem.
🏭 Other Emissions
The last 26% of emissions in Utah 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