Fossil fuels create greenhouse gasses that we don’t want, but why can’t we just use solar panels and wind turbines to power everything? Laura and Graham are joined by Dr. Andrew Rowe, the director of the Institute for Integrated Energy Systems at the University of Victoria, who explains how the electricity grid actually works and how much planning it takes to make sure that there’s always electricity there when you try to turn on the lights.  Solar panels and wind turbines have lots of advantages, but Dr. Rowe explains a few things we need to do while we invest in these types of technology to make sure that they operate to their maximum potential

In order to reduce our emissions, we need to know how many emissions are associated with any given service or product. While many emissions are obvious to see and estimate (like the emissions from a internal combustion engine car), some emissions are indirect and hidden (like the emissions created from building the car). Researchers use “life cycle analysis” to look at every stage of a products life and find out how many total emissions it creates. Looking up the results of a life cycle analysis can help us find out what options are more sustainable and help us reduce of overall impact on the environment.

Laura and Graham explain what a life cycle analysis is, and give some examples of how we can use it to find more sustainable options for our lives.

Papers referenced:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/328546118_Comparative_Life_Cycle_Assessment_of_Milk_and_Plant-Based_Alternatives

https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/cleaner-cars-cradle-grave

How Clean is Your Electric Vehicle? an interactive tool here :

https://evtool.ucsusa.org/

Look for us at Megawatts and microphones in Instagram and https://megawattsandmicrop.wixsite.com/mysite

What do greenhouse gasses have to do with energy systems? What even is a greenhouse gas, and if they’re such a problem why can’t we just ban them as we have with other harmful pollutants? Do cow farts cause climate change? Laura and Graham are joined by guest Dr. Theo Christiaanse who explains how we can track how fast we’re currently “spending” greenhouse gas emissions and how we can compare it to our global, national, or personal greenhouse gas “budgets”. Theo also explains some different types of technology we can use to make sure that our greenhouse gas balance sheet is properly balanced to meet goals set out by climate scientists.

The backbone of the whole podcast, the main concepts that will be used during the whole season.

What is an Energy System?

Welcome to M&M 

Join Laura and Graham along with multiple knowledgable people, to learn about energy systems, learn what is happening in the energy world and follow all theconversation that is in the news.

We want promote energy literacy to the listeners, but it’s also important to note that what we want to explain isn’t insanely complicated.

Everythyng that surrounds sustainable energy systems can be broken down into simple concepts, and that’s exactly what we plan to do.  

We want everyone to be able to be able to make their own informed decisions about the energy all sorts of issues that are commonly discussed in the news today.