Superfreakonomics - and a thought on industry vs the individual
Monday, October 12, 2009 at 11:10 Hey, this is interesting. The Guardian has an article on the new Superfreakonomics book, which describes
...an artful takedown of the fashionable "locavore" movement: transportation, Levitt and Dubner argue, accounts for such a small part of food's carbon footprint that buying all-local can make matters worse, because small farms use energy less efficiently than big ones.
It's always nice to see your instincts supported.
The question about the proportion of energy used by transport vs that used by food production brings up another one: What about the balance between industry and individuals?
Bear with me here. The 10:10 campaign in Britain is trying to get the great unwashed masses to reduce their carbon footprints by 10% in a year. All well and good; perhaps it's great if the people signing up are those folk who drive everywhere, fly every week, never recycle and don't care how high their energy bills are as they heat their houses by burning coal in open braziers while leaving the windows open. But I have a feeling that many of the folks signing up to 10:10 already have lower-than-average carbon emissions; and, more important, that this does nothing to decarbonize our energy supply - nor does it do anything about industrial energy or resource use. I'll come back to this in a future post, without doubt, but remember this: if we run out of water, it won't be as a result of you leaving your tap on while you brush your teeth.
Reader Comments (1)
Great post! Very well written!