Though we’ve been getting a lot more rain in Atlanta lately, I’ve clearly been in a blogging drought. Life has gotten in the way, but hopefully a revised shorter-entry approach will get me back on track.
Lord knows, there is a lot to talk about! While critical questions about climate change have gotten little airtime in the presidential race thus far, the “go green” movement is all the rage and countless corporations are hopping on board. I was most amused with a recent Chevy truck ad that featured two men driving other brands of pickup truck who were stranded and out of gas on the side of the road, until a Chevy truck driver who was clearly getting better gas mileage rescues them. Sheesh, I thought, that takes some major spin to get the consumer to be impressed by Chevy truck gas mileage.
Which leads me to my renewed purpose for this blog: what choices can we make that will have the greatest positive effect on our warming planet, and which choices are red herrings?
One prime example of a green fallacy is that all hybrid cars get better gas mileage than their conventional counterparts. In the article “Sounds Good, But…” in the most recent issue of Newsweek (April 14), Sharon Begley writes, “Only half of all hybrid vehicles on the U.S. market are more fuel-efficient than their nonhybrid versions, researchers at the Union of Concerned Scientists find: some models pair a big gas-guzzling engine with hybrid technology in a way that enhances only performance, not fuel economy…” A great dot-gov website for looking at all sorts of environmental statistics on any car, and comparing them side by side, is http://www.fueleconomy.gov.
Another website I want to plug is: http://www.grist.org/candidate_chart_08.html?source=liveearth. This website contains key information on the remaining presidential candidates’ stances on environmental issues ranging from fuel economy standards to nuclear energy. From my point of view, issues surrounding climate change, along with the War in Iraq, are my top priority in the presidential race and this site helped me to get a clearer idea of the three candidates’ energy policies.
Comments
Sharon Begley has an interesting book out there you might enjoy: Train Your Brain Change Your Mind. ….Have you heard of the Aptera 3-wheel electric? Or the air car? Lots of good stuff around the corner… Hope all is well in Atlanta.
Glad to have your thoughts and insights again, Envirogirl!
Good to have you back!
Oops! Try again. On “Fresh Air” on NPR today (4/14/08) there was an author, Michael Klare, interviewed about his book, “Rising Power, Shrinking Planet”. As I listened to their conversation, I became increasingly puzzled. His book is about the new world order being based on who has oil and who needs oil. He contends that this is fraught with potential for wars - an example being that we (the U.S.) get a great deal of our oil from Georgia, formerly of the Soviet Union. We therefore have troops stationed there and they are a stone’s throw away from Russian troops across the border. Potential for inadvertent warfare, at best. This made me realize, even more, what astounding amounts of our national resources we are pouring into getting oil. Seems to me that even the most neo-con of them all has to acknowledge that oil on this earth is finite and eventually - if for no other reason than it’s all gone - we will have to find other sources of energy. It seems that no one sees that with that same money we could become totally free of the need for fossil fuels through development of alternative fuel sources. I do understand that the oil and coal industries are very wealthy and powerful, but they can’t create oil and coal once it is gone. I wonder if there are any statistics on the cost of fossil fuel energy that include all of these factors? Don’t know how many reading this have watched the old Mel Gibson “Mad Max” movies, but this business makes it seem eerily possible for the world to turn into that.
Deon
Good to hear from you again, Kathleen. Begley is right - while the desire to “go green” is important, I’m afraid that the hybrid craze could easily become the “red herring” of the environmental movement. The popularity of the hybrid sticker can distract us from the fact that a 35 mpg regular car is better than a 30 mpg hybrid. It’s a good start, but has the potential of being similar to the token ethnic family found in many progressive churches - in an effort to be more culturally diverse, they point to the one ethnic family amongst the sea of white faces and declare themselves to be non-racist. Hybrids are good, but they’re only a small start - better to drive less!
And Begley’s Train Your Brain book is fascinating - I just finished reading it this fall.
Thanks for your posts!