Is there nothing they won’t whine about?
What can Cincinnati’s gas streetlights teach us about climate change?
Gas streetlights are iconic fixtures in some Cincinnati neighborhoods, from Clifton’s Gaslight District to Pleasant Ridge’s Gas Light Cafe. They’re more than a century old, and have been the focus of preservation campaigns, public safety efforts and budget cuts over the years.
Now, gaslights are the subject of a study from University of Cincinnati researchers, illuminating barriers to tackling climate change. Their findings are published in the Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences.
Professors Amy Townsend-Small and David Stradling say there are currently about 1,100 gaslights in the city. They run on natural gas and burn 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And, the researchers say, they’re leaky.
The professors found gaslights emit about 4% of the fossil fuels they consume, adding climate-warming methane to the atmosphere.
Her testing shows the average Cincinnati gas street light emits 1.7 grams of methane per hour. For comparison, gas stoves release 0.07 grams of methane and water heaters emit 0.2-0.3 grams per hour.
She says as Cincinnati works to transition away from fossil fuels and address climate change, there’s an opportunity to electrify gaslights. Converting the gas-powered lamps to electric is listed as a priority action in the city’s playbook to reduce emissions, the Green Cincinnati Plan.
They seriously wasted time doing this.
In the late 1800s, Cincinnati had about 10,000 streetlights. Approximately 1,000 remain today.
Professor Stradling studies history and says gas lights have been replaced over the years for reasons from cost to the fact that they aren’t as bright as electric streetlights.
The people in the neighborhoods love them. But, Warmists are upset about pretty much anything.
Teach seriously wasted time typing this?
It was a public service, to give you something to combitch about.
Classic tRumpism, then!!
You will deny it, but methane is a potent greenhouse gas. A gas lamp emits 25 times more methane per hour than does a gas range. For 24 hr a day! The Denier Teach questions why anyone would measure that.
We fully understand that you deny the scientific fact that greenhouse gases interrupt the “escape” of infrared radiation into space, causing the Earth to warm. With no greenhouse gases, the Earth would be a ball of ice!
In the first season of Restoring Galveston, Michael and Ashley Cordray pick up a huge Victorian in Episode 8, “Dream House,” and one of the touches in the restoration is to add dual gas lamps on the front porch, flanking the front door. The episode aired in 2019, and naturally I thought of the horror our friends on the left would have at such, and I smiled.
They went to New Orleans to look for the vintage lamps, and bought them at a store dedicated to such things; it’s good to know that capitalists are making money selling things that could be replaced with electricity, but aren’t nearly as nice.