My Earth Day Adventure. And Whalenol?

[Average Joe]

I went to an Earth Day event hoping to see technology for gathering, storing, and monitoring solar power and anything else falling under the rubric of what they advertised as “energy displays.” But the entire extent of them was an insulation guy, a solar-powered attic fan guy, and a couple of very small electric cars with no demo of the technology or anyone there to talk about them – just the little cars, sitting there. That was it for energy - unless you count the people touting spiritual energy. Other booths focused on things like alternative medicine, holistic medicine, holistic diet, therapies (holistic of course) for body and spirit, holistic pet food (really), and some kind of unusual fruit juice mix sold in glass bottles like wine and purported to have amazing health benefits (I don’t recall whether or not it was holistic). Some of these things looked like multi-level marketing schemes to me. There were also products made of hemp, and earthenware looking uh…things… not sure what they were exactly – holistic maybe. Local Democrat political activists proclaimed their presence with a booth and signs; no Republicans made themselves visibly Republican. The ACLU was there – maybe to defend advocates of reductionism in the face of the overwhelming bias for holistic things at this event – I didn’t ask. Sierra Club was prominent; I think they organized the event. There were also a couple church groups who said they were concerned for the environment. Also present was the League of Women Voters; there is no “League of Men Voters” – is that because men suspect the name is ungrammatical?

Whole Foods Market had a booth there touting their allegedly green products. I say “allegedly” because last time I was in a Whole Foods Market I saw a sign exhorting us to “buy local” and extolling the virtues of doing so. Below that sign were fancy bottles of water from New Zealand (and this was in the Continental US). I had wondered why it’s OK to haul water (a limited resource locally - but not THAT limited) from New Zealand and use the limited local water supply to grow local produce using resources that are scarce locally but plentiful in places closer than New Zealand. Does the store have some grudge against farmers and wholesalers in regions where produce grows efficiently or against truckers who haul things other than exotic water? I didn’t ask.

At the Earth Day gig, I looked around and right away suspected that plenty of the eco-pontificators on hand were probably eco-poseurs, more concerned with impressions and image than action and results. The hair gave them away; long, clean, hair, some obviously requiring elaborate grooming indicative of a willingness to expend considerable resources in order to make a certain impression. Real eco-saviors will have very short hair. Very short hair washes and rinses in seconds with little shampoo/soap required and no conditioner. So less water and fewer pollutants go down the drain. With short hair, you can easily have water left over in your little bucket after you shower (you use a bucket to conserve water rather than running it for the duration of your biweekly shower). Short hair also minimizes the risk of flee, tick, lice, or other infestation that can occur when you are out in nature on your clean up the earth campaigns. Plus your mask strap and snorkel won’t slip on or tangle in your hair when you are cleaning litter out of the aquatic environment. And short hair eliminates a handhold by which the police could grab you as you resist arrest after protecting the environment through disrupting the lawful activities of others or destroying private or public property.

I suppose I’m no eco-martyr myself. I do believe in conservation but I imagine the recycling, composting, pedaling back from the coop to their xeriscaped adobe and straw-bale communal homes with their bicycles loaded up with locally grown produce bundled in vegetable tie-dyed hand sewn hemp grocery satchel types (you know, like Al Gore) would consider me to be a depraved planet-buggering eco-thug because I wonder if some solutions advocated may not actually be worse than the problems they are intended to solve. The environmental gripes that irritate me most frequently are against people who leave their dogs’ poop in inappropriate places and people who are too eager to share their favorite music with the world (you know the ones – driving around rattling their surroundings like a dance party for the deaf). I do keep my hair short but the environmental benefits of that are coincidental – I tried it long recently and went back to short – high speed, low drag – it’s just easier and feels cleaner on my head. I drink tap water because it’s cheaper than bottled.

We do cook our food and light our home with electricity (some from a nuke plant I think) rather than burning wood or whale blubber. We feel good about it and save money since whale blubber is expensive – and demand may increase with the drive to convert whale blubber into biodiesel (whalenol) to fuel vehicles http://claytonbodiecornell.greenoptions.com/2007/04/01/international-whaling-moratorium-lifted-biofuel-bonanza/
http://www.autobloggreen.com/2007/04/02/whale-blubber-to-be-converted-into-biodiesel-vehicle-tailpipes/ ). I intend to avoid putting whalenol in my vehicle so I would support stringent labeling requirements to alert us to it. But if I don’t buy whalenol, someone else probably will – maybe to fuel ships and trucks carrying exotic bottled water from overseas.

We have to look further than the immediately visible consequences of practices that are purportedly good for the environment. I have heard that a man can lower his environmental impact by eating more plants/less meat and riding a bicycle when driving isn’t necessary. I wonder if that’s really true. Such diet and exercise might make him live longer and thereby spend more years consuming petroleum for plastics and adhesives in bumper stickers to update his Subaru with hip statements like “Whale Powered” or “Save the Plasmodium Malariae!” He’ll also need more food to fuel his bike-riding and his better developed muscles may burn a few more calories even when he’s not riding. He’ll also exhale more carbon dioxide. He’ll use more water in his metabolism and in the toilet flushing away more urine and more excrement. And he’ll probably take more showers to wash off the sweat. And then there’s all the biofuel needed to heat and/or cool his home in his extended twilight years – that’s a lot corn and whales up the smokestack.

Saving the planet seems like a complicated affair. If you buy only products made with cheap labor, does that lower your carbon footprint or raise it? If the labor is cheap does that mean the laborers’ (and derivatively your) impact on the environment is lower because they can’t afford to buy and consume much? Or does it mean their environmental impact is higher because they live under conditions in which people pollute heavily and live in their own filth since immediate survival is a more pressing concern than a clean environment? If you buy their products do you contribute to economic development that will accelerate the earth’s destruction as they consume more? Or does the economic development ultimately lead to higher standards of living and higher environmental standards? There is evidence that the US has grown cleaner as it has grown more prosperous – http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa364.pdf -pg 28.

[Martha]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Average Joe Other booths focused on things like alternative medicine, holistic medicine, holistic diet, therapies (holistic of course) for body and spirit, holistic pet food (really), and some kind of unusual fruit juice mix sold in glass bottles like wine and purported to have amazing health benefits (I don’t recall whether or not it was holistic). Some of these things looked like multi-level marketing schemes to me.

Thanks for the report. I have seen the same thing as you with the bogus "health" products. Very irritating. Read ads in magazines like Organic Gardening, Mother Earth News, or Backwoods Home. I actually have written letters to the editor complaining about the bogus claims in advertising.

[newguy88]

Gee we DID earth Day back in the early 70s. We screwed the planet up big time since then. I am so sick of hearing about being green that the only time I feel green is when I drink too much and wake the next morning.

[ERD50]

So agreed with the OP. I caught a few of the 'be green' segments on GMA this week - I was screaming at the TV with all the misinformation, and misguided 'good stuff'. Too long to list, I don't thing a single thing they mentioned was worth spit.

Quote:

Originally Posted by newguy888 Gee we DID earth Day back in the early 70s. We screwed the planet up big time since then.

newguy - you were a teacher, time for you to do some homework. This was posted above:

http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa364.pdf

check page28

Quote:

Between 1977 and 1997, levels of six major air pollutants decreased significantly: sulfur dioxide levels decreased 58 percent, nitrogen oxides decreased 27 percent, ozone decreased 30 percent, carbon monoxide decreased 61 percent, and lead decreased an overwhelming 97 percent (Figure 26).

These improvements are largely due to the regulations set forth by the EPA. The EPA, which was instituted under a Republican administration. Ironic?

-ERD50

[newguy88]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ERD50 So agreed with the OP. I caught a few of the 'be green' segments on GMA this week - I was screaming at the TV with all the misinformation, and misguided 'good stuff'. Too long to list, I don't thing a single thing they mentioned was worth spit. newguy - you were a teacher, time for you to do some homework. This was posted above: http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa364.pdf check page28 These improvements are largely due to the regulations set forth by the EPA. The EPA, which was instituted under a Republican administration. Ironic? -ERD50

I wonder what the air smells like in China?

[Notmuchlonger]

Quote:

Originally Posted by newguy888 I wonder what the air smells like in China?

Is this a trick question?

[newguy88]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Notmuchlonger Is this a trick question?

[FinanceDude]

Quote:

Originally Posted by newguy888 I wonder what the air smells like in China?

It's ok.......they didn't NEED to sign the Kyoto Treaty.......while we get flack for not signing it despite having the biggest anti-pollution pseudo-Nazi organization in the world, the EPA............

Trust me, Europe and everyone else LAUGHS at our EPA..........

[HFWR]

Yeah, what's up with all this clean air and water bidness?

[ERD50]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FinanceDude It's ok.......they didn't NEED to sign the Kyoto Treaty.......while we get flack for not signing it despite having the biggest anti-pollution pseudo-Nazi organization in the world, the EPA............ Trust me, Europe and everyone else LAUGHS at our EPA..........

I'm not following. Can you expand on that a bit?

Thanks - ERD50

[CuppaJoe]

Average Joe, you could ghost write for Andy Rooney, I couldn't "put down" your post. Thumbs up to this thread.

My favorite environmental nonsense is the advice to get out of your cars and ride public transit. Even if there is transit to equal your commute, it is already SRO; just a few more people getting out of their cars would overload it completely so that the transit system couldn't stop to pick up more passengers. Happens in my area all the time.

[HFWR]

DART (Dallas Area Rapid Transit) has recently added capacity...