sides of march (Brian DeMarzo)

Thoughts on life, liberty, and information technology

(Not) The Greenest Show on Earth

Today’s Wall Street Journal has an article, The Greenest Show on Earth: Democrats Gear Up for Denver, which highlights the attempts at the Democratic National Convention to run “the greenest convention in the history of the planet” (at least, at bequest of Denver’s mayor, John Hickenlooper).

Read through the article and you see how difficult it is to focus on green, renewable, carbon-free, Union labor for everything.

More interesting are the points the article didn’t make…

  • The convention’s Director of Greening, Andrea Robinson, hired an Official Carbon Adviser to “measure the greenhouse-gas emissions of every placard, every plane trip, every appetizer prepared and every coffee cup tossed.” One would wonder how much carbon is burned transporting all those placard, appetizer, and coffee cup samples… or the food waste (did they eat the appetizers?)… or the waste generated by the Official Carbon Advisor doing this job in the first place.
  • Even better, during the four-day event, “900 volunteers will hover at waste-disposal stations to make sure delegates put each scrap of trash in the proper bin.” Unless these 900 people are walking to the event each day, that’s tens of thousands of miles of transportation for these 900 people. OK, maybe they’ll all take public transportation.

Not to be outdone, the article points out that Republicans are on the bandwagon, too. Chief among their brainstorms is to ensure “each meal should include ‘at least three of the following colors: red, green, yellow, blue/purple, and white.’” That shouldn’t be hard, as some combination of FD&C color additives should be able to duplicate just about any color.

These are the people who are leading our country into the 21st century? This is where their priorities are? Look at all their effort (and so much waste) put in to this, when simpler solutions are at hand.

Simple solutions like getting your home to run 100% on renewable energy. I did this about two years ago by signing up with ConEdison Solutions. I pay a little more on my bill, and in turn my energy supplier guarantees that my energy comes from “65% run-of-the-river hydro and 35% wind power.”

True, they may lie to me, and get that energy from dirty coal. Maybe I should hire a Director of Green Power Alternatives to find out for sure, because, hey, if you’re working towards a green world, it doesn’t matter how much waste is left in your wake.

Isn’t that right, Mr. Albert Gore?

3 responses to “(Not) The Greenest Show on Earth”

  1. Chris G. Avatar
    Chris G.

    That is a neat idea, having the choice of a local power company that uses 100% renewable energy. As far as I can tell, I don’t have that option in NH. Something to keep watch on though.

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  2. harborpirate Avatar
    harborpirate

    Its ridiculous all the money that they’re spending on lip service. You can’t just “go green” overnight. If Denver doesn’t have the proper infrastructure to support everyone getting to their destination via public transportation, to recycle all the different types of waste, and provide renewable power to all the hotels, convention centers, and other facilities that are used; it won’t make a lick of difference how much effort goes into “being green”. Besides, even if all of those were true, what is going to transport the incredible amount of materials in and waste out of the convention? Big dirty diesel trucks.

    Isn’t that what politics is really about though, lip service and wasting money in frivolous pursuits? Honestly this is some of the thinnest I’ve ever seen, and I can’t imagine what kind of dolt really thinks that this will make any difference at all.

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  3. brian Avatar
    brian

    You know how I “go green”? I do this…

    I am very diligent about recycling, to the point where I pick the stuff my wife forgets to recycle (juice boxes, water bottles) out of the regular garbage and throw it into the recycle bin. OK, I don’t dig through, but if it’s near the top, I grab it. 😉
    I pay extra on my utility bill to ensure my energy comes from renewable sources (wind, hydro, etc.) rather than from fossil-fuel sources.
    I try not to waste anything. I resell everything I can on Amazon. I reuse cardboard boxes (and recycle what I can’t reuse). I avoid throwing out anything that may be of value to someone else.

    All of these things take just a little effort on my part, and bring real results. None of them require extra effort by anyone else.

    The one thing politicians miss is the incremental steps. Politics is about “changing the world dramatically.” Instead, it should be about making a bunch of small improvements.

    Want to reduce emissions? Find a way to reduce them by 1% every two years; don’t try to figure out how to reduce them by 50% in 2050. It’s a lot easier to reduce anything by 1% today than try to predict the future.

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