In a bid to fight climate changes in the world’s 5th largest economy and the United States third largest state, Jerry Brown who serves as the governor of California has rather shocked many by his bold step. The governor has already signed a bill that calls for 100% of his California states electricity to be generated from resources that are carbon free. For Jerry brown to have arrived at such an ambitious agenda, he must have been driven by the fact that climate change is currently the biggest challenge yet that has been facing the Golden State as witnessed by the devastating wildfires, droughts that are persistent, agricultural anomalies and public health crises.
Carbon emissions have had adverse effects on the environment as they contribute to adverse climate changes that in return can have serious repercussions to the humans and the environment as well. The burning of fossil fuels (coal oil, and natural gas) releases carbon dioxide among other greenhouse gases. Eventually, these carbon emissions raise global temperature through trapping of the solar energy in the atmosphere, which interferes with the water supplies and weather patterns. In a nut shell, the overall effects of the carbon emissions are enormous, as they affect the most critical areas of our environment.
Many may wonder, whether Jerry Brown’s idea of carbon free generated electricity sustainable? The wind and solar energy being some of the key alternative safe sources of electricity are relatively affordable and widely available in large quantities, making them the perfect candidates for future energy needs. However, they are recurrent, meaning that it’s not always going to be sunny and the wind will not always blow and the end result is that there is not going to be enough energy produced to meet the power demands. Also, it would require substantial energy storage and a number of technologies designed to achieve this. Other technologies that have potential include but are not limited to: geothermal, wave energy, micro-hydro, carbon capture and nuclear.
All these alternative sources have their challenges, but one determined Jerry Brown should not be slowed down by a few technological breakthroughs. The biggest obstacle that he could be facing as of now is the trade war between the US and China which could affect the American auto industry. His target was to have 5m electric cars on California roads, with Chinese companies being the potential manufacturers of these vehicles.
