Description:
The data were obtained from the Emissions and Generation Resource Integrated Database (eGRID), hosted on the US Environmental Protection Agency's website.
The table and graph display the heat input in MMBTU (the energy industry's way of writing millions of BTUs) and the CO2 output (in tons) for most electricity generation plants in California for 1997. Other state data are available in EGRID97. By comparing heat input to CO2 output, one can get a measure of the "pollution efficiency" of each plant. By examining the scatter plot, clearly there is one power plant that produces an excessive amount of CO2 for its heat input. Is this power plant an outlier because of false information, or is it truly wasteful?
One BTU is the quantity of heat necessary to raise the temperature of one pound of water one degree Fahrenheit from 58.5 to 59.5 degrees under standard pressure of 30 inches of mercury at or near its point of maximum density. One BTU equals 252 calories, 778 foot-pounds, 1,055 joules or 0.293 watt-hours.
The Emissions & Generation Resource Integrated Database (EGRID) is a comprehensive data base of environmental attributes of electric power systems. EGRID is based on available plant-specific data for all US electricity generating plants that provide power and report data to the US government. Data reported includes electricity generation (in MWh), resource mix (for renewables and nonrenewables), emissions (in tons for NOx , SO2, and CO2 ), emission rates (in both pounds per megawatt-hour [lbs/MWh] and pounds per million BTUs [lbs/MMBTU] for NOx , SO2, and CO2 ), heat input (in MMBTU), and capacity (in MW).
