Live Earth

[Medley]

If I've insulted your intelligence, I apologize. Certainly postulating that if 1,000,000,000 people (half of what was expected) watched the shows and made changes in their energy consumption - thus over time making the shows effectively carbon neutral - is not an insulting thought?

Here's a few facts from Time magazine, and it's associate, CNN:

Madonna (just as an example), flew in from New York in a private jet to appear onstage at Wembly.

The most conservative assessment of the flights being taken by its superstars is that they are flying an extraordinary 222,623.63 miles between them to get to the various concerts - nearly nine times the circumference of the world. The true environmental cost, as they transport their technicians, dancers and support staff, is likely to be far higher.

Matt Bellamy, front man of the rock band Muse, has dubbed it 'private jets for climate change'.

Bryan Walsh of Time Magazine, who covered the Tokyo show reported:

Organizers had stressed that the massive festivals themselves would be as green as could be — the Tokyo show was to be powered by solar energy and biodiesel made from recycled cooking oil. So I wasn't surprised to see an array of solar panels at the center of the information hall, apparently hooked up to a big-screen TV playing the feed from the concert stage next door. Very green, except for the fact that we were indoors, and there was no sun.

and then further down the article:

The Tokyo show drew much of its electricity from an existing solar plant on the grid, but that meant that Tokyo homes and businesses normally supplied by solar would have needed to supplement their power from dirtier sources. That's a net loss for the environment.

I could continue, but you get the idea.

Now, the idea that because Madonna talked about conserving energy, and because the audience might conserve a bit more than they did before the concert, that makes the whole event "carbon neutral" is not only ludicrous, it's hypocritical.

I should point out that Bryan Walsh went on to say that the carbon footprint was not the story- that the story was that a whole bunch of people got together an made a concerted (no pun intended) effort to improve the environment. On that issue, I agree.

Again, it's not the message that I object to, or really even the fact that they produced a huge carbon footprint to do it. It's the fact that they produced a huge carbon footprint to do it, then raved about how green the shows were. It's the smoke-and-mirrors. It's hooking solar panels up indoors, and using power from a solar plant that you know is going to be replaced with more conventional methods. It's jetting halfway around the world in a Gulfstream to tell me I need to reduce my carbon emissions, and then calling what you do "carbon-neutral", or even "environmentally friendly".

And you say the grand idea for this came from a politician? Imagine my surprise.

- Joe U.