U.S. gas-fired power boom reveals key emissions payoff in 2024
For the first time, > 1 B tonnes (t) of carbon dioxide (CO2) was discharged from U.S. gas-fired power stations in a single year during 2024, marking a new pollution threshold for the world's largest gas producer and consumer.
The 1.003-Bt emissions figure is 3.6% up from 2023, and marks a 40% jump in gas-fired power generation emissions since 2015, according to data from Ember.
Those numbers look large, but lack important context. Discharge from the U.S. fleet of coal-fired power stations was just under 620 MMt last year, a record low due to the smallest coal-fired power generation level on record.
As U.S. coal plants discharge 77% more CO2 per unit of electricity than gas-fired plants, the lower coal generation totals reveal that the U.S. power system has actually made steep cuts to overall pollution even as gas emissions have climbed.
Coal vs. clean. Thanks to the cuts to coal use, total U.S. power emissions from all fossil fuels were up only 0.5% in 2024 from 2023 to 1.64 Bt, and were down 19% since 2015.
What's more, that emissions load has declined despite total electricity generation climbing to all-time highs in 2024.
A rapid climb in electricity generation from clean power - including from solar, wind, hydro and nuclear assets - has helped meet much of the rise in consumption in recent years.
Total clean electricity generation was 35% higher in 2024 than in 2015, thanks mainly to a nearly eightfold rise in solar generation and a more than doubling in output from wind farms during that period.
But fossil fuels remain the backbone of the U.S. generation system, supplying just over 58% of all electricity last year.
Natural gas accounted for a record 73% of that fossil share, while coal plants supplied the remaining 26% or so.
Power firms plan to make further cuts to coal use over the remainder of this decade, while adding more renewables to the generation mix to ensure total electricity supplies continue to climb in line with demand.
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