Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Out of Control "Green"

Apparently, the latest fad in society is being "green." If see another commercial where a company blathers on about how "green" (meaning not contributing to the greenhouse effect), I may well break my television. Our society seems to have developed "carbon-phobia," as if CO2 is the most evil gas in the world. What's sad about all of this fear is that the link between human-produced CO2 and global warming is not as strong as the media would have us believe. We are worrying ourselves to death over something that is not as significant as we think. And in the fear of emitting CO2, we're adopting all sorts of measures that could have negative repercussions, economically and environmentally.
Economically, we're slowly wreaking our economy because we're afraid of building new power plants. The result will be an increase in demand and a huge upswing in the price of electricity. Nuclear power may well be the best political option, but the costs of building new nuclear reactors are also prohibitive.
Environmentally, the craze for compact fluorescent lamps (CFL) will create a toxic waste hazard because every CFL contains mercury. Most consumers are not going to dispose of their expired CFLs appropriately, and the end result will be an increase of the mercury levels in our landfills. Likewise, hydrogen power is not as "green" as people would have us believe. Hydrogen power emits water vapor as its by product, and water vapor not only is a "greenhouse gas" but also a major source of energy for thunderstorms. Here's what I mean: imagine a city the size of Kansas City with all of the cars powered by hydrogen. The emissions from these cars will increase the humidity in the Kansas City area significantly. This additional humidity will make summers more uncomfortable and also provide extra moisture for storms, meaning more heavy rain events (flooding) and more severe storms (hail, high winds, tornadoes). In other words, as we rush to hydrogen as if it's a savior, we need to remember that hydrogen power has its own significant side effects that we need to be prepared for.
Now, don't get me wrong. I'm all for being wise in how we treat the environment. If we can switch from highly-polluting oil to lower-pollution hydrogen, I'm all for it, even if the result is a more humid environment. But we need to be circumspect. The current "I'm more green than you" mentality preys on unfounded fear of a catastrophic greenhouse effect that's our fault. And that fear, if it drives our decision-making in politics and in life, could result in decisions that do more harm to our society and the environment than anything that global warming could ever cause.

1 comment:

incurable optimist said...

I think we need more of Kermit singing that it's not easy being green.