Update on Project Vulcan
Back in April, I blogged about Project Vulcan, describing what it was and the goals of the project. Now, some of their maps and graphs of carbon dioxide emissions have been released, courtesy of NASA's Earth Observatory.
As you can see by the image below, the highest annual carbon emissions pretty much, but not always correspond to higher population density.
The graphic below shows the top carbon emitting counties. Houston, TX is located in Harris County, Texas by the way.
Counties with the highest emissions are often, but not always, places with large populations. In some cases, a busy interstate highway through a mostly rural area or a power plant that supplies electricity to other counties (even other states) is enough to push a county up in the rankings, according to Kevin Gurney, an atmospheric scientist with the project.
The graph below shows the average carbon emissions by month across the U.S. As you can see, we are probably close to the peak right now. The scientists are not quiite sure why it peaks in the summer, but I agree that it is probably due to a combination of increased travel and a high demand for electricity to cool homes and businesses.
