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 For Aspen to take any meaningful action to reduce its global warming emissions, it needed to identify the sources and the quantity of greenhouse gas emissions. Our inventory of emissions serves as the tool to better understand the sources of emissions. Although it is known that the primary source of emissions is the burning of fossil fuels, it is important for a community to understand the impact from each sector. This chart shows the major sources of global warming pollution (aka greenhouse gas emissions) for the City of Aspen in 2004. Nearly all of the emissions are carbon dioxide emitted to the atmosphere from the combustion of fossil fuels, with a very small percentage coming from methane (landfill emissions) and nitrous oxide gases (fertilizers). The total reflects millions of small and routine acts of energy use such as turning on lights or driving to the post office. The inventory includes energy and emissions for tourists, second homeowners, and locals who travel by car, commercial airlines, and private aircraft to and from Aspen. As a destination resort it is not surprising that air travel - the town's economic engine - accounts for 41 percent of Aspen's emissions. The total is broken down into six major sectors: Ground Transportation accounts for 25.1%, Commercial Air Travel accounts for 22.2%, Private Air Travel accounts for 18.8%, Electricity accounts for 19.8%, Natural Gas & Propane accounts for 12.7%, Landfill accounts for 1.4% and Fertilizer accounts for .04%. Aspen Emissions Inventory 2004:
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