I had an interesting conversation with my wife's friend's son who is a buyer of natural gas for a large electronics company in Japan. He told me that they gene

I had an interesting conversation with my wife's friend's son who is a buyer of natural gas for a large electronics company in Japan. He told me that they generate all their electricity on site with gas. The main reason is that they need gas for heating furnaces and things, they need the waste heat from the generators and they need the electricity. While they could replace quite a lot of the things they have with electric alternatives, it basically means rebuilding the entire factory from scratch. It made be realise that it's going to be a bit of a long haul for getting industry away from greenhouse gas producing energy. BTW, this also largely explains why Japan's auto makers didn't have a massive problem when the nuclear power plants shut down after the Fukushima disaster. It's a bit depressing to think about it...