Fossil fuels produced just 33% of the EU's power in the first half of this year, the lowest share on record based on data going back to 1990, researchers said on Wednesday.
That’s incredibly misleading. 1990 is 33 years ago and a lot has changed. For one thing, nuclear is still carrying its weight when it comes to power generation. Many outdated power plants were shut down, especially coal being replaced by natural gas. Also, the overall economy had grown significant since then. So power consumption should have grown by a lot, but in reality it plateaued after 2008. And 2008 is telling, because that is about when the EU’s economy began to stagnate. Deindustrialization really began about that time too.
Take into account non-electricity fossil fuel consumption and it’s easy to explain where the emissions went. People will probably look back at that period and realize it was a major act of greenwashing and careful fudging of the numbers.
That’s incredibly misleading. 1990 is 33 years ago and a lot has changed. For one thing, nuclear is still carrying its weight when it comes to power generation. Many outdated power plants were shut down, especially coal being replaced by natural gas. Also, the overall economy had grown significant since then. So power consumption should have grown by a lot, but in reality it plateaued after 2008. And 2008 is telling, because that is about when the EU’s economy began to stagnate. Deindustrialization really began about that time too.
Take into account non-electricity fossil fuel consumption and it’s easy to explain where the emissions went. People will probably look back at that period and realize it was a major act of greenwashing and careful fudging of the numbers.