• Electricity and Natural Gas: 47% of total
  • Up 26% from 1990
  • Industrial and commercial sectors both up 36%, residential up 18%
• Transportation: 42% of total
  • Up 43% from 1990
• Agriculture – 11% of total
  • Down 4% from 1990

Overall, greenhouse gas emissions increased 28% in Sonoma County versus 14.2% nationwide. Population increased 18% during this same period.

 Some other results from the inventory:

• Per capita emissions from residential electricity and natural gas use stayed constant at 2.1 tons per capita.
• In the commercial sector, per employee electricity and natural gas use was up 12%, but per establishment use was up 27%.
• In the industrial sector, “Other” electricity and natural gas use was up 101%. This category includes street lighting. However, “Other” emissions are only 3% of the total from electricity and natural gas use.
• One major factor in the emissions due to vehicle miles traveled is that Sonoma County has the highest single occupant vehicle transportation mode (72%) of any county in the Bay Area except Napa County.
• Sonoma County emissions from electricity and natural gas use were up 26% compared to 11.6% for Marin and 3% for San Francisco.
• Sonoma County emissions from transportation were up 43% compared to 7% for Marin and 4% for San Francisco.
• Marin and San Francisco populations both increased 7%, compared to 18% for Sonoma.

 These results suggest how Sonoma County might best prioritize efforts to approach zero net carbon. Transportation, new development and electricity and natural gas use in existing applications each have unique challenges to shifting to non-fossil fuel energy sources. The next sections of this paper describe how to accomplish the removal of carbon in each of these applications.

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