Very Green

On New Year's Day, The Washington Post had an editorial by Martin Bunzl, a philosophy professor at Rutgers University. His piece, Ulysses and the Hedge Trimmer, discusses his anxiety about global warming and the conflict between his desire to reduce carbon footprint and his wish to get a good deal:

I spend most of my waking hours worrying about how to reduce my output of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. Yet my behavior seems to march to a different drummer. I need to get the best deal. For me, not the world. When it comes to what counts as the best deal, my values don't get incorporated into the calculation. I am attuned only to price.

He compares himself to Ulysses, who wanted to listen to the Sirens but instructed his crew to tie him to the mast so he could avoid their danger. Bunzl essentially wants the government to outlaw any product that is not environmentally friendly, including his latest purchase, a gasoline-powered hedge trimmer, so that he can avoid the temptation of buying what he wants!

Of course, some of his agenda is moving forward: the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 requires that all light bulbs use 25 percent to 30 percent less energy by 2014, which should extinguish the incandescent light bulb; compact fluorescents and light emitting diodes will be the only choices. An article by Gerard Voland, the dean of the School of Engineering, Technology and Computer Science at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne, discusses this and some of the "difficulties" with CFL bulbs: they don't last as long as they should, they dim as they age, and the inconvenience and risk of disposing of them.