Electric Boogie

12,133 -- per capita annual electricity consumption (kilowatt-hours) in the U.S. in 1997

1,381 -- per capita annual electricity consumption (kilowatt-hours) in the rest of the world in 1997

21.5 -- percentage increase in U.S. electricity consumption from 1990 to 1999

43 -- percentage decrease in utility funding for energy efficiency from 1993 to 1998

90 -- percentage of total U.S. coal consumption used to generate electricity in 1998

33 -- percentage of all mercury emissions in the U.S. that came from coal power plants in 1999

30,000 -- number of lives cut short in the U.S. each year due to pollution from electric utilities

37 million -- number of cars necessary to produce the amount of smog-forming pollution that comes from U.S. coal power plants each year

7.5 -- percentage of total U.S. energy consumption from renewable sources in 1998

94 -- percentage of total U.S. renewable energy consumption from hydropower and bio-mass (trash and wood incinerators)

$216.7 billion -- revenue of the U.S. electric utility industry in 1999

$124 billion -- approximate combined revenues of all the governments in Africa

90 -- percentage of total electricity used by a standard incandescent lightbulb that is wasted as heat

1,000 -- reduction in pounds of carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere by replacing one incandescent lightbulb with a compact fluorescent bulb, over the bulb's lifetime

Sources:
1 -- Calculated by dividing U.S. consumption in 1997 by the 1997 U.S. population estimate from the U.S. Census Bureau.
2 -- Calculated by dividing world consumption (minus U.S.) in 1997 by the 1997 world population (minus U.S.) at the U.S. Census Bureau.
3 -- U.S. Department of Energy, Energy Information Administration, Electric Power Annual Report, Volume 1.
4 -- American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, State Scorecard on Utility Energy Efficiency Programs 2000.
5 -- U.S. Department of Energy, Energy Information Administration, "U.S. Coal Supply and Demand: 1998 Review."
6 -- Clean Air Network, "Mercury Sources Factsheet (pdf)," Aug 1999.
7 -- ABT Associates, "The Particulate-Related Health Benefits of Reducing Power Plant Emissions (pdf)," Oct 1999.
8 -- Environmental Working Group, "Up In Smoke", Jul 1999.
9, 10 -- U.S. Department of Energy, Energy Information Administration, " U.S. Renewable Energy Consumption," Mar 2000.
11 -- Edison Electric Institute, "1999 Year in Review (pdf)."
12 -- Central Intelligence Agency, "World Factbook 2000."
13 -- U.S. EPA and U.S. Department of Energy: Energy Star: Compact Fluorescent Lights.
14 -- U.S. EPA, How you can prevent pollution prevention in your home, Aug 1998.