“The world’s tech leaders all need large amounts of electricity to drive their data centers, but they don’t all get their power the same way.,” Alexis Madrigal reports for The Atlantic.
“Some, most notably Google*, have made an effort to reduce the amount of coal that powers their data centers. Others, like Apple, HP, and IBM, have not,” Madrigal reports. “Those three companies get half or more of their power from the carbon heaviest fuel of them all, according to a new report from Greenpeace.”
Madrigal reports, “Absent any kind of real energy policymaking in this country, people who care about climate and energy can only use their consumer dollars to influence the way that companies behave. So, this disparity in company strategy should be highlighted. There’s just no reason that Apple can’t locate its datacenters in places with a cleaner electrical generation mix. None. They’re too profitable to pretend otherwise.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: You know what should really be highlighted? So-called “reporters” who can’t even do the most basic research and instead lazily regurgitate press releases from a bunch of PR-addicted bozos. Here, let us do your job for you, you hack:
• New aerial images of Apple’s planned NC fuel cell, solar farms published – April 7, 2012
• Apple’s massive fuel cell energy project to be largest in the U.S. – April 4, 2012
• Apple plans USA’s largest private fuel cell energy project in North Carolina – April 1, 2012
• How Apple took the lead on the environment – February 22, 2012
• Apple patent application reveals next-gen fuel cell powered Macs and iOS devices – December 22, 2011
• Apple’s Mothership campus solar roof will be among biggest in U.S. – December 7, 2011
• Apple working with US company, Leaf Solar Power, on North Carolina solar farm – November 8, 2011
• Apple patent app details highly-advanced hydrogen fuel cells to power portable devices – October 20, 2011
• Apple building huge solar farm around its billion-dollar North Carolina data center – October 26, 2011Any article that fails to reference the work Apple is doing and the massive expense that Apple is undertaking in order to bring massive fuel cell projects and solar arrays online is either the work of an inept amateur and/or plain old yellow journalism. Consider that a site that goes by the URL greentechhistory.com is “The Former Homepage of Alexis Madrigal,” and draw your own conclusions.
Alexis Madrigal is a senior editor at The Atlantic.
His email address is: amadrigal@theatlantic.comGet the real story behind Apple’s environment footprint here
Greenputz and its shills just can’t resist finding SOMETHING to complain about when it comes to Apple. Next thing you know, it’s going to be that Apple’s employees breathe too much oxygen.
They can’t “resist” it because they are not an environmental organization and never have been. That’s like the candy story “cover story” in front of a boiler room run by mob bosses. The truth is that Greenpeace only cares about one type of green. And they want their piece of it. A big piece.
well said.
Says who? Show me links. Show some evidence.
From everything I’ve read, Greenpeace has led the fight to clean up the oceans and some of the most polluted spots on the planet. Like PETA, you might not agree with some of their publicity approaches, but you can’t deny they want to do some good in the world.
I’m tired of people bashing groups that are trying to IMPROVE things. Or do you think it’s somehow bad to want to clean up the environment and protect natural resources for future generations?
Dear MSM Pawn,
• Greenpeace names Apple ‘least green’ tech company – April 21, 2011
• Greenpeace drops Apple to 9th as HP, Samsung advance in ‘Guide to Greener Electronics’ – October 26, 2010
• Greenpeace spotlights links between Apple’s iPad, the Internet, and climate change – March 31, 2010
• Greenpeace: Apple fails to meet ‘computer detox’ deadline – January 07, 2009
• BusinessWeek: Apple is greener than Greenpeace says – December 08, 2008
• Apple’s score plummets as Greenpeace expands ranking criteria in its Guide to Greener Electronics – June 25, 2008
• Greenpeace intends to ride Apple’s PR coattails for as long as possible – January 18, 2008
• BusinessWeek: Why Greenpeace repeatedly makes flawed attacks on Apple – October 26, 2007
• Chemical Industry Group slams Greenpeace over unfair iPhone criticisms – October 22, 2007
• Greenpeace admits that Apple’s iPhone is fully compliant with Euro chemicals rules – October 16, 2007
• Apple faces lawsuit based on Greenpeace’s ‘toxic’ iPhone Report – October 15, 2007
• Greenpeace attacks Apple over ‘hazardous chemicals’ in iPhone – October 15, 2007
• Apple greener than Greenpeace wants you to think – May 03, 2007
• Greenpeace ranks Apple dead last in ‘environmental friendliness’ – April 03, 2007
• EPA does not support Greenpeace’s charges against Apple Computer – January 07, 2007
• Apple places last in Greenpeace ‘Guide to Greener Electronics’ report – December 07, 2006
• Is Greenpeace lying about Apple’s ‘toxic laptops?’ – September 25, 2006
• Greenpeace ‘Guide to Greener Electronics’ report called ‘misleading and incompetent’ – September 02, 2006
• Greenpeace criticizes Apple over toxic waste – August 29, 2006
I get it. Greenpeace doesn’t like Apple.
But it doesn’t make them out to be Greenmailers. Just that Apple is the biggest target in the world right now, and by mentioning them in their press releases, it guarantees them coverage in every paper, blog and radio report around the world.
Like I said, I don’t like their PR choices, but I can’t argue with what they want to accomplish.
P.S. I hate the MSM as much as you do. Probably more, since I started my career as a journalist, and I know how bad reporting has become in the past 30 years.
Damn boy, you sure have some free time on your hands!
You didn’t answer his question at all.
“Some, most notably Google*, have made an effort to reduce the amount of coal that powers their data centers. Others, like Apple, HP, and IBM, have not,”
This is not true. Apple is already installing fuel cells to power their NC data center, and the fuel cells are powered with natural gas.
Dear Alexis,
It’s not worth logging into your crappy site, so I’ll just outline my POV here…since I respect it….
Bias much?
Apple is only building the largest Fuel Cell and Solar plants ever created for their SE data center. If only Eric were still on Apple’s board, he would have likely copied those plans as well and perhaps Google would then have some slightly broken version of such plants going online late and inefficiently. Alas, he has to steal ideas from new and less innovative sources.
Good luck ever getting a job as a “real” journalist. Then again, I’d suggest putting in your resume at MSNBC; they seem perfect for you.
p.s. I like coal, love fracking, and after November, will very much look forward to homegrown energy that keeps us out of foreign wars. Wars that far more adversely affect the environment than does domestic production.
Re rwross:”homegrown energy that keeps us out of foreign wars”
if you believe our former Republican Supreme Court appointed President, Dubya, we went to war looking for OBL in Afghanistan and WMD in Iraq.
Bush said of OBL “he can run, but he can’t hide”. Despite this, OBL ran and hid until Seal Team 6 under orders from President Barak Obama ordered his execution. Fail Bush.
Bush bet the farm that there were WMDs in Iraq despite being assured by experts from the IAEA and UN weapons inspectors that there were no WMDs in the country. We went in , looked desperately for them and found them not. We did manage to spend a trillion dollars and get an awful lot of people killed or maimed.
Republicans used to always run for Federal office claiming superior ability in national security, foreign relations and economics. In 8 years, Dubya managed to eff up a booming economy into the harshest recession since the Republican Great Depression, destroy our diplomatic relations worldwide, tarnish our reputation with torture and illegal rendition, and start two wars that will have damn near bankrupted our country while accomplishing nothing.
In case you are too young to remember or maybe just were not paying attention, that is the record and Bush had a Republican House and Senate for his first 6 years in office. Don’t blame it on anybody but the NeoCons.
Franklin Roosevelt was president during The Depression, you might consider obtaining a library card.
The Depression started in 1929, Roosevelt was elected in 1932 and entered office in 1933. I have a library card, thanks. You might well try using yours.
The height and breadth of The Great Depression was during FDR’s term. That is an historical fact, jackass.
*Most historians consider October 29, 1929 to December 7, 1941 the span of The Great Depression.
Actually, that’s NOT historical fact. It has the ring of truthiness, though, doesn’t it.
Much like the 2008 collapse of the financial sector, the damage was done under GOP rule, and the then-president didn’t do much to fix it. It took about a year for Roosevelt’s policies to take full effect, and the economy swiftly rebounded gradually throughout his term of office. To say the depression didn’t end until we entered WWII is silly.
The war stimulus certainly helped (see, government intervention into the economy DOES work, even with borrowed money), but the worst of the worst was long over by the end of the 1930s.
Here’s a link to some basic facts about the depression and the years 1929-1945:
http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/Timeline.htm
Listen you historical re-writers, the height and breadth of the Great Depression was 10/29/29 to 12/7/41, during that period, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a democrat, was the United States president 88% of its duration.
@ kaplanmike wrote: “…economy swiftly rebounded gradually throughout his term of office.”
Um, How does something swiftly rebound gradually? Or did you mean that it gradually rebounded swiftly? I’m confused by your semantics.
1929 – Hoover – Unemployment: 3.14%
1930 – Hoover – Unemployment: 8.67%
1931 – Hoover – Unemployment: 15.82%
1932 – Hoover – Unemployment: 23.53%
1933 – FDR – Unemployment: 24.75%
1934 – FDR – Unemployment: 21.60%
1935 – FDR – Unemployment: 19.97%
1936 – FDR – Unemployment: 16.80%
1937 – FDR – Unemployment: 14.18%
1938 – FDR – Unemployment: 18.91%
1939 – FDR – Unemployment: 17.05%
1940 – FDR – Unemployment: 14.45%
1941 – FDR – Unemployment: 9.66%
http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/Timeline.htm
Read the link again:
YEAR GNP Growth
1930 -9.4%
1931 -8.5%
1932 -13.4%
1933 -2.1% (FDR takes office)
1934 +7.7%
1935 +8.1%
1936 +14.1%
1937 +5.0%
1938 -4.5%
1939 +7.9%
By the way, there was a recession from May 1937 to June 1938. The GOP scored some gains during the 1936 elections, and they forced FDR to cut back on stimulus spending. The economy almost immediately tanked. It wasn’t until Democrat gains in the midterm elections of 1938 that FDR was able to restore federal funding to about 10 percent of GNP, and the economy again began to improve.
Technically, the Depression actually peaked early in 1933, when the unemployment rate peaked at 24.9 percent. In 1930, early in the Depression, when Hoover did NOTHING to fix the problems, the unemployment rate was only 8.7 percent.
“but the worst of the worst was long over by the end of the 1930s….”
1938 – FDR – Unemployment: 18.91%
1939 – FDR – Unemployment: 17.05%
1940 – FDR – Unemployment: 14.45%
lol, the worst was over? you’re an idiot too, Kap.
“Much like the 2008 collapse of the financial sector, the damage was done under GOP rule,”
This is what I love about revisionist. They know just enough to point fingers.
Democrats were in charge of Congress from 2006-2010.
The entire collapse was based on the fraud housing market set up by Democrats in the 90’s.
Bush was trying to manage a war and keep the economy going.
Obama can’t do one GD thing right.
Unbelievable what people choose to think just to justify their ‘team’.
The GNP is no measure of the tragedy and suffering of The Great Depression, only the unemployment rate was (and is)…ask any survivor of that era whether they gave a rat’s ass about the GNP or if they cared whether there was a breadwinner in the family.
The Depression started in 1929 under Republican Herbert Hoover, the 3rd Republican President in a row who served with a Republican Congress. How about that for a historical fact.
Hoover did what Republicans always do- nothing of value or the wrong thing and cut taxes and spending. The Depression worsened and Roosevelt was elected in 1932 and assumed office in March 1933 with a Democratic Congress, which enacted the bulk of the New Deal.
Things began to slowly get better and then the Republicans had their usual fit of incoherent rage- demanding budget austerity. Roosevelt acceded in part only to see things regress- although not as bad as before.
The cardboard slums of homeless men were named Hoovervilles in honor of the man who did nothing while the economy crashed and burned- Republican Herbert Hoover.
see above…Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a democrat, was president during the breadth and depth of the Great Depression. period.
I can see you are set in your opinion and are unable/unwilling to consider any other, but here is the wrap up:
1- The Great Depression began under a Republican President & Congress. The Republicans had been in charge since the end of the Wilson Administration over a decade before.
1- The Hoover Administration & Republican Congress was totally ineffective acting against the declining economy- cutting spending and taxes (Sound familiar?) even as unemployment, credit and purchasing got continually worse.
2- Roosevelt assumed office in March 1933 and during the first 3 1/2 months enacted the bulk of the New Deal. For those playing along at home, that would put the calendar at June 1933 before any of Roosevelt’s programs were enacted- at minimum. Just like with Obama taking over from Bush, the bottom happened during the first 6 months of the Democrat succeeding the Republican’s administration. Things moved upward from that point.
3- The only slump from then until the end of the Depression was after the 1936 election when Republicans regained some seats and forced a reduction in the stimulus to the economy. This caused a retrenchment in the economy.
Lesson- Republicans are as abysmal in their understanding of economics as they ever have been. Just like in foreign affairs & national security they claim to be better, but the record shows otherwise.
it is not my opinion, it is a matter of historical fact, I never stated that the Depression didn’t start under the last year of Hoover’s term, I stated (several times) that the breadth and depth of the Great Depression was under the FDR administration, a democrat. Please learn to fucking read.
Your statement was made in such a way as is commonly used by NeoCons to deny Republican involvement with the Great Depression. It matters not under whom the majority of the recovery existed- but who was at the wheel when the iceberg was hit.
look, you jackass, I am not a neocon or a libtard or any of that crap..unlike yourself, I can read.
From end of October, 1929 to beginning of December,1941: Hoover was president 27 months, Franklin Roosevelt was president 106 months…FDR had The Great Depression solved for him by the Japanese…simply draft your workforce into a war and the unemployment rate drops dramatically.
oh yeah, there was nothing to fear but fear itself.
+1
People get the government they deserve.
@progressive douche bag:
I am not a Republican nor a Democrat, but your crazy assed biases render your opinion so beyond the pale as to make rebuttal all but pointless.
Clearly your love affair with our current President has blinded you to his massive escalation in Afghanistan and an undeclared war in Libya. Why did the US go into Libya when but not Syria or Rwanda even though both these latter countries have far more human atrocities being committed? One word. Oil.
So, take your meds and get that Bush derangement syndrome in check, blinky. He’s not the president anymore…your guy is. And he’s clearly incompetent.
More oil, gas, and coal production at home means we can keep our noses out of their millennial long efforts to kill each other.
1st, I didn’t vote for Obama as I feared, correctly, that he is Republican Lite- a DINO. So don’t lay your hatred at my feet.
2nd, Bush & Cronies denied that it was about oil. Yes, I know they lied- it’s the Republican way.
3rd, when the fracking has destroyed all the drinking water supply will you be enjoying all your made in the USA energy?
On MDN Take… That’s all true… but they didn’t make these changes YESTERDAY, and they haven’t single-handedly transformed the condition of workers throughout China, so they are very, very bad.
Now if climate change as the media sees it were actually true as well. It too I’d just another lie that’s changed it’s name from global warming.
It is true.. The name change was done by anti-global warming people to make it not sound as bad as it is. (A euphemism.)
C’mon MDN! You know isn’t fair to the rest of us that Apple uses coal when they have enough money in the bank to convert all their facilities worldwide to ultraslow carbon footprint facilities. Nor can we trust a company who hides away $100B in the bank without bringing jobs home to the USA.
If these “environmentalists” would just go back to their science books, they would realize that to offset the greenhouse gases, all they would need to do is PLANT MORE TREES! As Bugs Bunny would say, “What a bunch of ultra-maroons!”.
But doing things like trying to stop deforestation and reclaiming/ replanting and caring for new trees would be expensive, and not only would that reduce a special kind of green footprint, it wouldn’t be as commercially visible or viable as the publicity generated by bitching about Apple.
That’s one of the things Greenpeace is fighting for:
http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/en/campaigns/victories/forests-victories/
If you add up all the energy produced by solar, wind, and other green alternatives in this country, (all of it), their output wouldn’t equal the output of one coal mine.
This is great news. Coal is the most dependable and least expensive source of electricity we have available today. No need to waste shareholder value on anything else unless something else can beat coal on coast and dependability. The Bloom Energy boxes could be a source of long-term cost savings for Apple too.
Re MDN Take:
When you fly electronics and components all over the world by jet aircraft your footprint is most definitely NOT green. The ability to custom order an engraved iToy days before Christmas and have it delivered to your abode in Opossum Gulch, Arizona is an amazing feat of logistics that represents the beating our environment is taking from globalization.
The whole globalization economic model is unsustainable both environmentally and economically. Cannot put a time stamp on when the music stops, but the clock is definitely running.
Until Apple moves to a regional or local assembly model it’s business cannot be considered green despite one really nice green data center.
you’re an idiot.
Actually, he’s right.
uh no, actually, he is not.
Climate change is politics and religion masquerading as science. This is why climate change zealots never accept questions. They simply point to anyone with a question and shout DENIALIST! It’s just like a religious freak shouting heretic or infidel!
The solutions they come up with are always based on transfer of wealth schemes and taxes, as if taxes would remove one iota of CO2 from the atmosphere.
It’s sad. They’ve done such a horrible job with half truths and total lies that they’ve idamage legitimate reasons for getting off fossil fuels as quickly as possible.
No, the DENIAL of Climate Change and Evolution is religion masquerading as science.
Feel free to worship the sky gawd of your choice in your own way and time. Just remember, however, that you have no right to force your wishful thinking upon those of us who have given up fairy tales as a basis for life, society, law, ethics and culture.
Thanks, Agent. I was starting to grind my teeth. The foolishness voiced in many of these little diatribes would be quite laughable if thy didn’t drown out the more sensible voices.
You see, here’s the thing.
I do not deny climate change. Climate change happens. It has happened repeatedly over the regions of this planet over the course of billions of years, the vast majority of which human beings were not present.
What I QUESTION is the validity of the “science” that suddenly claims the chief cause of climate change is anthropogenic.
Do you get that? Probably not because you’re one of those religious guys who just yells DENIAL! Then puts his hands over his ears.
This is a standard leftist technique. You attempt to mock that which you cannot argue against. You call names when you have no basis for your opinion. You make ridiculous assumptions with no regard for facts whatsoever like saying that I don’t believe in evolution when 1. I am an atheist and 2. I only subscribe to reason, logic, rational thought, and the scientific method. (With a dose of humor).
Your attempt to turn anyone who questions climate change “science” into one of the sorts of people who denies evolution is pathetic. It’s pure liberal methodology though. As a result you obliterate the possibility for uncovering truth through discourse.
Therein lies the problem. I am perfectly willing to pursue alternative energy. To do so just makes sense. I can arrive at this conclusion while still finding the climate change political and religious movement highly questionable. I can look at the data, and even knowing that it is manipulated to provide certain results, still come to the conclusion that it is obviously worthwhile to pursue renewable sources of energy, if for no other reason than we prevent further conflict between ourselves and the rest of the world over a dwindling resource.
If a dimwitted conservative such as myself can do that, why can you, a hyper intelligent progressive, not see that taxing mom and pop bakeries out of business because they can’t afford a CO2 tax is just plain silly? Why can you not see that moving around money doesn’t effect climate change in the least?
I’m all about new sources of energy. I’m addicted to electricity. PLEASE show me a viable technology. I can show you one but you’re likely to go ballistic when I mention it, that being nuclear of course.
Now, I suppose all of this will go through your progressive reasoning methods and the word, “racist” will pop out, right?
I understand what you’re saying, and I can certainly argue with you on the facts. So let’s talk facts: No one is arguing that climate change has happened for billions of years without man’s involvement. But you can’t deny that over the past 250 years or so, we’ve been playing around with powerful forces we don’t understand.
Humanity has pushed levels of CO2 up so high, so fast, natural processes on the planet seem incapable of adapting fast enough. Hence global warming, hence global climate change (since warming causes more than just heat; melting arctic ice could disrupt the gulf stream, cooling Northern Europe).
FInally, I’m glad you’re open to alternate energy. Lots of those who mock environmentalists refuse to consider it. (Like the poster who said all “green” energy added together doesn’t add up to the output of a single coal mine. Almost certainly not true.)
Ultimately, I think we agree more than we don’t — especially about the ultimate need for new sources of energy to feed our mutual electricity jones. I think nuclear is fine, just show me the solution to the waste problem. (And until we find someone willing to put the waste in their backyard, it’s a problem.)
I’ve read about a lot of promising tech — fuel cells, neighborhood nukes (fueled with thorium instead of uranium), fusion, tidal flows, geothermal, solarnanomaterials — but none seem quite ready for prime time.
For now, I’m a big fan of solar photovoltaic. I think they should be installed on every flat roof in sunny climates. But I’m open to other options, too.
I refuse to believe both sides of the aisle can’t come together on this. To me, it’s even more of a national security issue as an environmental one. I’m tired of funding Saudi Arabia, Iran and Venezuela. Aren’t you?
See, none of your post got past my progressive reasoning methods.
We’ve just got to stop shouting at each other (I’m guilty, too) and start listening. If we could permanently ban the words “libtard,” “commie,” “wacko,” “extremist,” “fascist,” “denier” and, yes, “racist,” it’s amazing how much common ground we’re likely to find.
“No, the DENIAL of Climate Change and Evolution is religion masquerading as science.”
Really? Last I checked I was a Christian, and I believe in science and evolution. Furthermore, members of my church include several doctors (some of whom are in medical research, specifically the human genome project), lawyers, university professors in biology, software engineers, etc.
My point being, we are hardly afraid of education or science. The OP is correct. The denial that there has been any bias or data tampering in the anthropogenic global warming community, and that the UN has any ulterior motives in promoting the idea, seems very fundamentalist to me. There are smoking guns testifying to data tampering, and the UN has been looking for some way to establish a revenue stream for decades. A global carbon tax, administered by the UN is the answer to their fervent prayers.
Of course you’re afraid of science.
You believe in an invisible man that floats in the sky, instead of logic and evolution and the big bang theory, etc.
What part of my post didn’t you understand? Did I use too many polysyllabic words? You might want to look up George Ellis and Francis Collins.
If you have no facts and nothing better than “is not” denials and straw man attacks it would be better to keep your mouth shut and not expose your lack of intellect.
Climate Change is only controversial on Right Wing Radio, Faux News, World Nut Daily and many evangelical congregations. Just like Evolution.
It’s pointless talking sense to those addicted to blind hate.
Only the willfully ignorant would deny that logic, reason and faith go hand in hand.
I personally know literally hundreds of Christians who are doctors, surgeons, lawyers, musicians (with whom I have a particular affinity) police officers, dancers, scientists, painters, politicians, engineers, technicians, dentists, pilots, broadcasters, pro sportsmen, financial advisors and so on and so forth.
None are ‘crazies’, none are fools and I am not aware of one that buys (as you do) everything they’re fed by the media.
This is a Mac fan site, petty childish insults are out of touch with this forum and reality in general.
Once you resort to argumentum ad hominem, you automatically forfeit your case.
Now please go back to reddit where you belong.
MDN is the one who brings the high church if Ayn Rand into the mix of Mac News.
2nd, I do not buy what I am fed by the media. I used to work with the media in a previous career and know the backstory. BTW- national media is heavily biased to corporate America- not in any way liberal- for economic issues.
Stating the fact that Bush was appointed by 5 Republican Supremes without standing or that evangelicals are attempting to impose a theocracy is not ad hominem- it’s plain and simple observed fact.
Again, the straw man argument that only demonstrably ignorant or dishonest people differ with your opinion. That’s dishonest. There are many, many credible scientists that have jumped of the AGW bandwagon, or never got on to begin with. Those that go along for the ride have some very large monetary motivation in the form of federal and UN grant money for studies that return the “correct” results. The evidence is clear and it has been published. There is no credible argument that the data presented by pro-AGW scientists was not cherry picked, massaged, and outright fabricated.
Dear renewable crop hugger,
Research study: The entire Earth heated up in medieval times/a>
Damn those ignorant serfs tooling around in their Hummers and those evil rich lords with their coal-fired electric plants! Eat more tofu!!!
You’re one of those guys who probably insisted cigarette smoke had nothing to do with cancer, or that working in a mine didn’t really cause lung disease, or that Agent Orange was safe to spray on our troops (not to mention on half of Vietnam).
Of course, taxes don’t remove CO2 from the atmosphere. But tax policy certainly does get companies to clean up their act, which DOES remove CO2 from the air.
And I don’t need to shout “DENIALIST”! The broad consensus of thousands of scientists working the field are doing that for me just fine.
No kaplanmike, I never questioned the harm of tobacco. I do question whether someone smoking on a beach can harm me. That is another example of science taken and turned into religion and politics. The powerful anti-smoking lobby hates cigarettes so much that they can actually get such laws passed.
I can understand the issue of 2nd hand smoke in closed in public spaces like restaurants and theaters, for example, but the beach? Basically they aren’t going to be satisfied until they completely remove the ability of those who wish to, to smoke. Look into tyranny of the majority.
Taxing corporations based on CO2 output is silly. They just pay the tax and keep dumping out CO2. Kooky ideas like cap-n-trade, i.e. I’ll sell you my CO2 credits because my particular business doesn’t output so much CO2 so you can keep outputting CO2… that doesn’t remove CO2 from the atmosphere either.
Forcing the EPA to declare CO2, the gas that most animals on the planet breathe out and most plants photosynthesize to be called a pollutant, come on. If that ain’t politics and religion, nothing is. You know that’s silly. By having the EPA claim that CO2 is a pollutant, guess what? You now have a hammer you can beat more money out of businesses with, in the form of fees, fines, and taxes. Instant income stream.
Why not just say, hey Mr. big business. You have x amount of time to cut your CO2 emissions by Y%?
Or better still… cut your CO2 emissions and we will cut your taxes by a percentage based on the percentage of reduction. Incentivize CO2 reduction!
Those ideas will never come out of this White House…
Because it’s not really about cutting CO2. It’s about the sneaky new way of creating more revenue.
North Carolina has stolen so many jobs from New York City and New Jersey and now we’re finding out that they are powering all of these businesses with dirty coal. FOR SHAME NC financial community. You’ve had after 9/11 until now to pressure the local utility to go green.
ENTIRE MOUNTAIN RANGES of FOREST HAVE BEEN DESTROYED BY CLUELESS GREENIES.
I was driving in south East Asia, in some countries like Malaysia you can drive for HOURS and see nothing but oil palm estates. The Jungle has been cleared as far as the eye can see, entire mountain ranges of the oldest rainforests in the world to plant oil palm.
Oil palm has always been important but the recent crazy boom happened because crazy greenies fought for BIO FUELS. (I believe it takes hundreds of pounds of oil palm nuts to make a gallon of fuel). Some Western countries have laws now that mandate that a certain percentage of fuel has to be bio fuels…. so warm up those chain saws, they’re happily cutting down rain forests to plant oil palm, sugar cane for bio fuels destroying species every hour from the Amazon to Borneo ….
Crazy greenies remind me of activists who want to help poverty stricken third world workers by CLOSING their factories, “dudes go relax and STARVE, you don’t really want to work for foxconn” … lol.
Uh, those forests were destroyed by people looking to make a quick buck, not the people pushing for biofuels.
And it wasn’t environmentalists who said to use corn as a biofuel. It was agribusinesses and the corn industry (notably Monsanto and Cargill) who pushed that boondoggle.
Scientists warned early that it took nearly as much energy to grow the corn (if not more) than it would produce as biofuel. They recommended that ethanol come from weed crops (switch grass, hemp), agribusiness waste or algae instead. But the big money pushed corn, and that’s what we got.
greenies had NOTHING to with it?
dude, it’s cheaper to drill for oil than to grow bio fuels.
greenies pushed governments etc for more use of bio fuels (instigating various acts and laws by governtments. For example car companies had to produce a certain percentage of ‘alternative fuel’ vehicles) before they thought of the consequences… Of course of the big money guys used that to make money.
“They recommended that ethanol come from weed crops (switch grass, hemp),”
LOL, make your suggestion into law and corporations will HAPPILY CUT DOWN THE AMAZON TO GROW HEMP.
you’ve just proved my point.
I’ve been all around, you should open your eyes…
Greenies are crybabies with no real solutions – at least, nothing that’ll amount to a hill of beans. Everything they suggest would cost billions of dollars and irreparably harm an already-faltering economy.
So nice and easy to sit at your computer and pseudo-anonymously tout this, that & the other thing as the be-all, end-all solution to the world’s problems. Yet I’m willing to wager that progressiveagentprovocateur (oooh, how gauche a nom de plume . . . yet how positively 60’s chic . . . did you work for the discredited Rachel Carson or was MI5 more your style?) and most of his ilk either (A) work for someone ELSE’S company without worrying about real-world issues such as paying invoices, meeting payroll, and, ya know, that little bugaboo that our Federal government makes soooo easy to do – keeping people employed, or (B) are trust-fund babies going to college on mommy & daddy’s hard work, with profits and wealth garnered in a much more practical time and environment (pardon the pun).
Get a clue, greenies. Here, I’ll even throw you a helpline: Look up “Little Ice Age”.
Yaah, I knew you could!
the carbon footprint of web browsing on an iPad is VASTLY lower than that of a laptop of desktop PC. By switching to ARM for many computer tasks between the iPhone and iPad, Apple has saved billions of dirty coal KW hours. No other computer company has done more to change the course of computer end user energy usage and packaging materials than Apple. Greenpeace is a fraud – their credibility has jumped the shark.
So, what’s wrong with coal?
Uh, virtually everything, from the way it’s mined, to the treatment of coal miners, to the environmental damage it causes both at the mine site (trailings and waste ponds) and at the power plants (emissions).
On the other hand, it’s cheap and abundant, so it’s the perfect energy source for America, right?
What’s wrong with cheap energy?
It’s very dirty. Pollutes a great deal. Dangerous to for human beings to acquire, but so god awful cheap and plentiful it’s hard to break free of.
You forgot about the acid rain that not only render lakes and some streams unihabitable but contributes to Maple tree deforestation in the North East US. Another by product of coal burning.
Funny how, from my experience, most of the green fanatics can’t keep the veins of the own body free of illegal toxins.
+1
weird too that those self polluters (from what I see around me) want the evil taxpaying corporations and citizens to support them on welfare.
The town of Maiden where Apple’s data center is located get power from a nuclear plant, not coal. As for fuel cells they are way more thermally efficient at producing electricity than conventional means. This means lower CO2 output and a greener foot print with even further opportunities to make that footprint smaller.
“Liberal care about your intentions
Conservative care about the results.”
Actually, most liberals care about both.
Actually, most people SHOULD care about both.
Actually, most people DO care about both.
you’re a cartoon.
Coal is the future and the past. Mine it!
So what if Apple purchases electricity from coal burning power plants? It is not feasible to obtain all energy needs from wind or sun. If it were not coal the troglodytes would be complaining about nuclear, natural gas, or hydroelectric power.