[space reserved for Fountainhead joke]

My wife pointed me to an article on the Green Lantern area of Slate by Nina Rastogi titled “Which is better for the planet, beer or wine?” The article focuses on comparing the carbon footprints of beer and wine.

Now I’m going to digress for a minute and rant about something that really pisses me off. The term ‘green’. I fucking hate it. It doesn’t mean anything, but has fast become the marketing term of our time. Need to move more widgets? Paste green on the box. The most ironic part of the whole ‘green’ movement is how at odds it can be with can be with the concept of carbon footprint. Take Hybrids for example. If you need to purchase a new car, buying a Hybrid will reduce your carbon footprint. If you buy a Hybrid just to be a trendy fuck, you’re not doing the world a bit of good. Much of a product’s carbon footprint comes from manufacturing. Buying a new car when you don’t need one is a huge waste of manufacturing. We can apply this same idea to reusable shopping bags. The carbon footprint of recycling plastic and producing a reusable bag is the same as producing hundreds of regular plastic bags. If over time, your reusable bag can carry more groceries that a carbon equal amount of regulars bags, you made a carbon positive decision. I think the better answer is to continue using ‘one use’ plastic bags. After you bring them home, line your waste cans with them, negating the need for trash bags. Or, layer them up and use them just like a ‘green’ bag. It just doesn’t look as cool strolling through Whole Foods with a bunch of evil ‘one use’ bags. Again, fashion wins out over functionality.

The other problem I see with ‘green’ products is their dependencies. A product stops being ‘green’ when it forces other products to use more energy or create more waste. Earlier this year I built a HTPC (home theatre PC) for my living room. One of the components I purchased was a Western Digital Green Drive. WD claims that the drive draws 4-5 fewer watts than a standard hard drive. I decided on this drive because, sitting in the living room, I wanted a quiet computer. I chose parts that all had low power draws, creating less heat and reducing my need for noisy fans or a large power supply. If it had not been for my application, I would not have chosen this drive. The ‘green’ drive has slower RPMs and slower access times that other drives available. This means that the entire computer has to stay on longer to perform the same task; drawing a lot more watts than the 4-5 the drive is saving.

Now that I got that out, we can get back to the article. What did I think about it? I think the author hit on a concept that I fully agree with. Packaging, shipping and storing are a huge part of a product’s carbon footprint. If you can buy local, you are probably going to reduce your footprint no matter how it was produced. Does this mean that I am going to stop drinking all the great beers that the world has to offer. Absolutely not, but you have to remember that I am an evil Republican and it is our ultimate goal to purge every living thing from the planet that we can’t teach to either secrete petroleum or swing a coal pick. Listen up Polar Bears, I’m talking to you.

Seriously though, even if you don’t give a crap above carbon, buying local helps the community. So, the next time you are having a local pint or picking up your imports at a local bottle shop, give yourself a pat on the back. As for me, don’t worry. If it makes you feel better I am much more of a Libertarian than a Republican. I’m just too lazy to change my voter registration and regurgitate Ayn Rand novels.

Cheers!
Kevin