Duplicitous Green

     Let me begin by saying that I am not in favor of deliberately or unnecessarily polluting the planet on which we live. I am also not in favor of manufactured solutions to artificial problems, like global warming, becoming public policy. I do not use "green" products because, very frankly, I have not found one that performs its function as well as its "non-green" equivalent. I believe that when it comes to protecting the environment, there are no better methods than those that come from conservative thought. I am the ultimate recycler, the majority of my furniture consisting of re-purposed items being a testament to that fact.
     The "green" lobby that petitions politicians on behalf of the green industrial complex is duplicitous in both its thinking and actions. Energy efficient refrigerators are exemplary of this condition. Sure your energy efficient ice box will save you $100 a year on energy costs, but having only a third of the life span of pre-energy efficient refrigerators, it will end up costing you much more than that old box. And it is not only the individuals additional costs in replacing the energy efficient refrigerator, but the extra energy it uses to manufacture, sell, and deliver the new box. And these efforts must be engaged three times as often as with refrigerators of the past.
     Recycling newspapers may seem at first glance to be saving trees, and in so doing, saving the planet. But when one adds in the costs, both in real dollars and energy expressed in BTUs, of collecting, transporting, and processing all those old newspapers, it really does not make sense from an environmental standpoint. And the fact that there are more trees in the continental United States now than at anytime in the last 200 years, means it is a resource that does not need saving. The timber industry over the last 70 years has done an excellent job of replanting more than what they harvest.
     Electric cars, which receive their recharging from electricity provided by coal-burning plants, are not winning any awards for energy efficiency. Beyond the range problems, expense, and inconvenience of electric cars, is their enormous contribution to environmental pollution through the mining of the minerals necessary for their batteries. Not only that, but the United States is trading being dependent on Middle East sources for oil, for being dependent on South American sources for lithium that make electric car batteries work.
     The supporters of compact fluorescent light bulbs defend their use of mercury by saying the reduced amount of energy they use reduces the mercury being spewed into the air by the coal-fired electric plants. But like much of what the Left uses to sell their oppression, the preceding argument is based on theory and speculation tied in a nice neat package of static analysis. There is no on-to-one relationship between a single bulb and the amount of mercury put in the atmosphere by the power plant that illuminates it. Therefore, using a compact fluorescent bulb that requires less electricity is not going to reduce the amount of time the plant must run to fulfill all energy needs demanded of it. Those plants will still be operating 24/7, 365 days a year. No amount of light bulb tyranny by Leftists is going to change that fact.
     The duplicitous nature of the modern "green" movement does not help advance the cause of conservation or individual liberty. Its goal, like that of every other Leftist movement, is to destroy or severely hamper capitalism and the free market. Leftists, like the "greenies," are unable to function in a competitive, free, and results-driven system and attempt to use environmentalism to impede and subjugate those who can.