GreenBiz.com
04/10/07
WASHINGTON, April 10, 2007 -- The Environmental Protection Agency has released a report on energy use trends in major manufacturing sectors that highlights the environmental implications of energy use. In an extensive 200-page report released today, the EPA looks at the 12 sectors that together use 85 percent of the country's industrial energy supplies and finds there are significant ways to reduce energy usage and pollution and greenhouse-gas emissions by improving their operations, adopting cleaner fuels, and taking advantage of the latest R&D.
The report analyzes each sector's current energy consumption trends and the associated environmental impacts, specifically emissions of air pollutants and carbon dioxide. Under a business-as-usual scenario, energy consumption across many of these sectors will increase by 20 percent from 2004 levels by 2020, and carbon dioxide emissions will increase by 14 percent.
The report shows how each sector could improve environmental performance by becoming more energy efficient or by using clean fuel technologies. It also identifies five strategies that could be used to achieve these goals: switching to cleaner fuels; using combined heat and power; retrofitting or replacing older equipment; making process improvements; and investing in research and development.
Although total energy used by the U.S. industrial sector has declined over the last 10 years, the decline is due as much to growing use by commercial, residential and transportation sectors as it is to improved energy efficiency within industry.
The industrial sector as a whole uses the most renewable energy of any U.S. sector, at 5.0 percent of total use, but it also uses the most heavily polluting coal-powered energy. As federal, state and international governing bodies increasingly take action on global warming, these industries face serious financial threats to already-thin profit margins.
The insights and recommendations in the report are intended to give the industries studied options and opportunities to save money while also protecting the environment. The sectors examined in this report are:
Alumina and aluminum
Cement
Chemical manufacturing
Food manufacturing
Forest products
Iron and steel
Metal casting
Metal finishing
Motor vehicle manufacturing
Motor vehicle parts manufacturing
Petroleum refining
Shipbuilding and ship repair The EPA has created a website providing more information on the Sector Strategies Program, and the full report is available for download from GreenBiz.
Source : http://www.gnet.org/news/newsdetail.cfm?Page=1&NewsID=34871
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