I sort of agree, the word 'green' is very annoyingly overused. Especially because there are so many different environmental issues that you often have to trade off against each other - are you concerned about CO2, about air quality, about water quality, wildlife diversity, any of a thousand others? They're all important, IMO, but as Ben Goldacre would say, I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that...

Such as CFL lightbulbs. Sure, they have mercury in them. So do you regularly smash lightbulbs and take a deep breath of the fumes? Seriously though, CO2 and stuff aside, burning coal releases quite a bit of mercury into the atmosphere. The mercury emissions alone avoided because of the electricity saved by a CFL more than outweighs the mercury contained in said CFL, in the unlikely case that it breaks and is released. If you break a CFL just open the windows wide for a bit and try not to inhale too deeply. (I'm still not a fan of CFLs, the light quality just isn't quite the same, but I use them in places where it doesn't matter too much. They also last for ages so save money and energy in that way.)

And Al Gore is leading by example. Oooh, he's got a big house the evil bastard. Well, he's rich. You may not like it, but he can afford it - and since his house is all solar-powered and carbon neutral (and he spent a *lot* of his own money getting it that way), I'd say he's doing pretty well in the "not being hypocritical" stakes. I'm pretty sure he drives a Prius, actually - there was a story some time back about his son getting a speeding ticket in a Prius. Er, bad example maybe, as speeding rather ruins the Prius's fuel economy. He also doesn't have a private jet (as I assume the 'train or commercial airlines' bit implies), though that doesn't stop the Al Gore bashers from criticising him for having one. Oh, and since we're on the Al Gore bashing, you forgot the big one - Al Gore is fat LOLOLOL!

I'm with you on sugar/salt/fat content, especially as they're not necessarily as bad as they're made out to be, but then where is the 'food police' trying to ban those things? The horrible 'nanny state' people love to hate is mostly pushing for better labelling which seems reasonable to me. Transfat is a different issue by the way - it is genuinely scarily bad for you, but doesn't really add to the flavour, it just makes things cheaper/easier to produce. So transfats being phased out isn't a matter of your beloved deep-fried pizza burger or whatever the fuck being BANNED!!! or made less tasty, it's actually being made slightly less bad for you.
Incidentally a friend of mine reckons (from reading actual research papers) that deep-frying stuff in lard or dripping is actually no worse for you (and possibly better) than sunflower/rapeseed oil.
(julius, Tue 13 Apr 2010, 12:33, Reply)