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Lake Superior is warming fast. Its national parks are starting work to cut fossil fuels

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Isle Royale National Park
Wikimedia Commons

Across the country, national parks emit around 179,000 tons of carbon dioxide annually

The five national parks around Lake Superior are working to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

Tom Irvine is the executive director of the National Parks of Lake Superior Foundation. He says these efforts actually started years ago with plans to stop using diesel generators on Isle Royale:

It's been a dream of the park service for years to be able to shut those generators down and create a green energy source to power the island… and that being primarily solar and solar battery storage.

Other parks have started working to cut emissions, from electrifying chainsaws to changing how buildings are heated.

Across the country, national parks emit around 179,000 tons of carbon dioxide annually. The National Park Service says that’s equal to driving 40,000 gasoline-powered cars for a year.

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Reporter, Interlochen Public Radio