Forgive me, Al Gore.
Dear Al,
Please don't hate me. It's my friend's birthday tomorrow and she's having a BBQ. I thought it'd be fun to bring along a 6-pack of Corona beer and a lime. A little piece of Mexico, you could say. Here's the thing...I live in France. Nowhere near Mexico. And, yes, they do sell Corona at one of our local supermarkets. You can get it almost anywhere! Well, obviously, it was imported from Mexico. Not sure if it came by plane or boat. And today, I went to the market across the street from my building in order to buy a lime. It was slim pickings over there for limes and the only ones they were selling had a big 'ol sticker on them that said "by air". Yikes. What could I do, Al? One must drink Corona with a lime. It's refreshing! You know what I'm taking about. ;)
I'm figuring that my carbon footprint has grown immensely with these 2 purchases. I hope you will forgive me someday.
BTW, I'm still hoping you'll still consider hopping your sweet self into the running for the race to the US presidency. Am I wasting my time even thinking about that?! Be honest.
Sincerely,
Someone who did vote for you back in the day
6 comments:
I don't want to depress you, but unless it grew in your garden and/or was made in a workshop from your backyard (with raw materials coming from your backyard too) you're polluting...
And a lime is nothing compared to any electronic equipment or piece of clothing you've ever bought (and I'm not even mentioning the conditions in which those items were manufactured)...
To reassure you though if you calculate the amount of kerosene it took for that lime (dividing the quantity of kerosene from the plane by the number of items on that plane) it's most likely lower than the gas used by the farmer next town to bring you whatever organic food he produces.
I am going to miss my Coronas. *sigh*
i cant remember where it was (The Economist maybe?) that had an interesting article about how there is so much more than just the distance that goes into calculating the carbon footprint of food (or whatever else).
And that things grown somewhere warm where there isnt need for heated greenhouses, where it is naturally wet enough, where the soil is rich and doesn't need to be fertalized, etc and then put on a boat to the final destination can be much less energy intensive than getting it at a farmers market from a guy who drove a few hours to bring the goods there.
so enjoy the beer! :)
Dude, I need the beer to feel better after David's comment.
Sorry Jen,
I didn't mean to depress you or anybody else...
I was just trying to say that there's no way to not pollute in our civilization.
But I also think that these new trends like calculating your "footprint" and such are diversions from the real issues, or even worse, a way for governments and corporations to put the blame on the people when they're the ones that can make a difference, not the people. Well, if the American people stopped using their cars so much it wouldn't hurt. But even that, if car builders would make gas efficient cars that wouldn't be a bad idea (How come I can drive about 450 miles with a full tank in France and only 300 in the US (with a tank that's usually bigger?)
But in the end, it doesn't even matter so much anymore because this is what China and Indonesia (and to a lesser extent India) do that will make a difference for the planet.
Well... That actually was depressing... But it's too early for a beer... damn.....
Yeah...but someone on france Inter was talking about the carbon footprint of all the hours we spend on the net too, compared to say in teh 80s when no one had a computer.
I knew a guy in Manchester england who refused to buy a car because of ethical reasons. The result was that his aged mother in law spent every day and every night in that house with the TV turned off, for environmental reasons.
Not much fun when three blocks away the local minimarket is pumping out ten thousand kilos of megawatts in lighting and keeping frozen prawns from Madagascar cool...
I don't know what to think...
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