Italian port cities are planning to connect large ships like cruise liners to the grid while they're berthed to cut fuel consumption and potentially slash carbon dioxide emissions by 30 percent and nitrogen oxides and particulate pollution by more than 95 percent.

Venice, Paolo Costa, La Spezia and Lorenzo Forcieri are all expected to install new equipment to allow the ships to plug in to shore-side electricity.  Other cities around the world are experimenting with the same idea, including Los Angeles and Goteborg, Sweden, hoping to eliminate the fuel needs and emissions of onboard generators.

The Italian electricity utility Enel foresees large reductions in pollution and fuel consumption from the practice, but since so far only a few ships are compatible with on-shore electricity, we won't know the full benefits until ports and ships are equipped and the generators are turned off.

via Green Inc.

Many of us were disappointed by the State of the Union address Wednesday night.  Sure the president stressed the importance of a climate bill and clean energy development, but he also committed to pursuing more nuclear energy, new offshore oil drilling and "clean" coal.

That makes today's announcement that the Federal Government will reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 28 percent by 2020 very welcome news.  The largest energy consumer in the U.S. will cut its emissions by making gains in efficiency and using more renewable energy.  The government spent $24.5 billion on electricity and fuel in 2008 alone and hopes to save $8 - 11 billion over the next decade through this initiative.

Each agency had to submit a 2020 emission reduction target from their 2008 baseline and the 28 percent reduction goal is an aggregate of those reports.  The Office of Management and Budget will validate and score each agency's plan and annual progress will by reported online to the public.

You can check out some of the emission cutting projects that are underway here.

via White House release