So today is National Blogging Day, celebrating a bunch of self-important naval gazing. They'd be able to save the planet if it wasn't for us high-powered people who turn up the fly all over the place, leaving our families, make lots of dough (and give a lot in taxes) and generally make the US GDP go up.
Thomas Friedman, quite succinctly, points out that all this Global Warming prevention is essentially worthless.
In consulting, you typically don't deal with marketing BS but deliver recommendations that "move the needle," or in normal terms have a measurable impact. Therefore, there's only one way to make a measurable impact on global warming.
Hey, I’m really glad you switched to long-lasting compact fluorescent light bulbs in your house. But the growth in Doha and Dalian ate all your energy savings for breakfast. I’m glad you bought a hybrid car. But Doha and Dalian devoured that before noon....That’s why we’re fooling ourselves. There is no green revolution, or, if there is, the counter-revolution is trumping it at every turn. Without a transformational technological breakthrough in the energy space, all of the incremental gains we’re making will be devoured by the exponential growth of all the new and old “Americans.” - Thomas Friedman, Sep 19, 2007 NYT
If you want to stop global warming, nuke India and China back into the stone age.
That's about the only way to stop global warming, folks. Because India and China are full of good, hardworking people who want to make a better life for themselves and the ones they love, just like you and me, and that typically involves electricity, a car, and Air Conditioning.
By recycling a coke can, you actually accelerate global warming, because you perpetuate the capitalist system, free trade, and global economic development. And that activity far outweighs the incremental energy savings of converting a recycled can back into a base form for reuse.
The reality is that we're just going to have to deal with the consequences of a warmer planet, whether we like it or not.
