The 7 Live Earth concerts scheduled around the world for July 7, 2007, are great examples of carbon hypocrisy.If the Live Earth organizers and stars really want to be “green”, here is the best advice:
1. Cancel the concert, and get all those people who are driving to stay home.
2. Keep the stars in their jets from wasting fuel – and increasing by carbon emissions – by staying home. A tele-concert would be the greenest option.
3. Eliminate all the disposable paper products for snacks and drinks at Live Earth too. Composting is a good start, but instead of “reducing,” why not just eliminate?
4. Donate the money from tickets to the environmental group of your choice – it makes more sense than paying it to organizers and stars who have to take their cut first.
5. Don’t forget that the “environmentally friendly” compact fluorescent (CFL) lightbulbs contain mercury, a neurotoxin. Hopefully Live Earth will be using some other more environmentally friendly replacement. Ten years from now we are going to be hearing about lawsuits from people towards the companies manufacturing these “environmentally friendly” bulbs because governments have forced them to stop manufacturing the older bulbs.
6. Replace diesel and biodiesel generators with taps into the much more efficient power company networks. Generators are inherently polluting. To truly reduce carbon emissions, if possible, use nuclear, wind or solar power. (Of course nuclear is still better due to much less significant carbon manufacturing footprint as compared to solar and wind power.)But again, it is really about throwing a concert to help the stars careers while lecturing the rest of the world not to behave like the stars do.The most environmentally friendly Live Earth concert, is no Live Earth concert. Let alone seven concerts.
———Update: July 7th.A nice Daily Mail article on the environmental impact of Live Earth.Some high points in the article:
1. Superstars are flying 222623.63 miles to get to the various concerts.
2. Carbon emissions will total around 31,500 tonnes for the live events.
3. Total emissions around 74,500 tonnes
4. 1025 tonnes of waste is generated at the sites, most going to landfills. (Wembley states 2/3s will do so.)
5. Madonna has an average annual carbon footprint of almost 1018 tonnes, compared with an average of 10 tones per Britishfamily.The full article shows more of the Live Earth hypocrisy.
Update: July 7The Washington Post has more to add:The article begins with ” ‘If you want to save the planet, I want you to start jumping up and down!’ Thus Madonna revealed her plan to combat global warming.”
1. Carbon Footprint’s John Buckley stated that Live Earth would produce about 74,500 tons of carbon dioxide gas.
2. 100,000 trees would need to be planted to effectively counter “Live Earth”