Think Progress:
Gore Responds To Drudge's Latest Hysterics
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And that’s just the Big Dogs! Last night this lil brouhaha was the lead item; today it’s been bumped down to the bottom because of its age. But, I digress.
I found something useful and interesting at the Think Progress link. In the body of the TP post is a link to a site that allows you, encourages you, to calculate your personal “carbon footprint.” So I did. My results (a screenshot from that website) are on the right, click for larger.
I’m shocked! Shocked, I tell you! My carbon footprint is “larger than average,” even though my car gets about 30 miles per gallon, I drive about half the miles an average American drives in a year, my entire frickin’ domicile is probably less than 20% of the square footage of any of the eight bedrooms in Algore’s home and my aggregate utility bill is about three percent of Algore’s. I’m biased, of course, but I feel I live pretty damned frugally and a helluva lot, a WHOLE HELLUVA LOT, more modestly than most. And yet my carbon footprint is “larger than average?” Or could it be an inconvenient truth that this site’s sole purpose is to induce guilt?
Oh, Hell. It’s all my fault and I’m SO sorry the planet’s gonna burn up. Forgive me; I knew not what I was doing.
Update 2/27 - 1320 hrs: Do NOT miss The Anchoress on this subject. Excellent points, excellent writing, and excellent linkage.
I am average, but like you, I think the whole thing is a farce. There was no place to show how many rooms in my house I had to keep cooled or heated, and no place to enter information on how many miles I flew in my private jet each year.
ReplyDeleteAnother thing I find interesting, it seems that only politicians and hollywonks are pushing this global warming scare. I don't hear much from reputable scientists about it. Could it be that America's elitist class is afraid us peasants might use up all "their" fuel?
I got average. Becky is right, it does not ask enough questions to be real. I think because you answered 1 person living there, that skewed things. Also, try putting a comma in the mileage you drive to see if that makes any difference.
ReplyDeleteWe're smaller than average - 3.25 - but I noticed that when you change states, the numbers go up. Why is that? If you lived in California, you'd be 6.25. Why should it matter what state you live in? Maybe it's because all the cool people live in California.
ReplyDeleteHey, Buck. It's also in how many people are in your house. I switched all your info with mine and the only other thing that brought your number down was adding people to El Casa Móvil De Pennington. So what you have to do is go round up a room mate and then you can proudly say you have a carbon footprint smaller than average! Heck, add five. And then move to California.
(What is Gore's, I wonder?)
Your points are well-taken, Becky.
ReplyDeleteLaurie...the mileage field won't take a comma. I tried. And it did occur to me that if I were 2 or 3 people the footprint number would be lower. But... why try and jigger the results, eh? And two people trying to live in this small space (which gets on my nerves, occasionally) would result in severe physical or mental damage to one or the other parties. Eventually, but more than likely much sooner than that.
We did it again, Bec! (Commenting at the same time.)
ReplyDeleteI think the different states use different types of power generation sources. NM has a lot of coal-fired power plants, in addition to our somewhat-famous wind farms. CA, on the other hand, has more nuclear plants. I find it interesting that those eeeevil nuclear plants may become more popular now that CO2 emissions are more eeeevil than nuclear waste...