Is buying green really green?

Mr. Brueghel reports a Wired Magazine article:

The new issue of Wired magazine has a great article about the many fallacious "solutions" to global warming that are really just guilt-sops. I don't want to get political here (I swore off it; I'm not even reading the news and the apocalypse is getting on just fine without my attending to it), but I still get CRAZY MAD when people talk about buying green stuff. BUYING THINGS IS NOT GREEN. Wired's case in point: manufacturing a Toyota Prius uses the BTU equivalent of 1,000 gallons of gasoline. A used car, on the other hand, has already paid its carbon debt, in terms of lifetime emissions per mile including emissions from the manufacturing process. BUY USED. SHOP GOODWILL.

Another item on this blog is a reflection taking the bus. Read it here.

And a sea level rise map:

Arizona Nature and Spirtuality has a new Carbon Footprint Calculator at their site.

This particular calculator does a quick calculation of your carbon emitting activities, and provides you with an estimate of your overall personal carbon footprint. Toggle with the answers to see how small changes can make a big difference to your footprint, then make pledges or learns tips to reduce. Keep in mind this only tracks you personal actions, and that in terms of a national average, industry and public services actually pull individual averages up quite a bit higher.

Click here to do a quick calculation. For kids click here.