Simon I-Could-Give-A-Shit Cowell Tops List of Celebrity Polluters

Appalling and horrendous: not just the singing on American Idol (who watches that these days?) but also host Simon Cowell’s dirty habits that have made him the top celebrity polluter. Simon’s average carbon emissions are 457g/km.

Known for flying around in a private jet, he has said that he prefers to travel that way because, as the Guardian quotes him, “the champagne’s better and you can smoke, which is a rare pleasure these days at $36,000 feet”.

The rest of the list is, in descending order, Jay Kay (this guy has enough money to be a top polluter?), David Beckham (no surprise there), Rowan Atkinson (Mr. Bean? WTF!) and 50 Cent (again, no surprise). Bentleys, Hummers, Rolls Royce Phantoms and Ferraris are among the many vehicles they own. Apparently, one or two mega-expensive luxury cars isn’t enough for one person – they each own an average of four.

Surprisingly, 4 out of 5 of them are Brits, not Americans. I wouldn’t have pegged that! Americans are far more renowned for over-consumption of just about everything, so it seems natural that American celebrities would top the smog-peddler list. Learn something new every day! Time to step up the green education, Great Britain, you’re not looking too good.

Link [Ecorazzi] + [The Guardian]

Photo credit: FOX

Bad Carbon Karma: Lawyer Flies from Oregon to Saudi Arabia Every Three Weeks

Thomas Nelson, a lawyer from Oregon, regularly flies back and forth to Saudi Arabia to visit a client who can’t fly to the U.S. That’s ‘regularly’ not as in once or twice a year, but every three weeks. Nelson says he’s forced to do so because his client faces charges here for financing terrorism, and that he’s afraid to communicate via telephone or email due to possible surveillance.

From the New York Times:

Because he is constantly shifting time zones to see his client face to face, “I just don’t sleep normally anymore,” Mr. Nelson said. “But I don’t have a choice. It’s very clear to me that anything I say to my client or to other lawyers in this case is being recorded.”

Across the country, and especially here in Oregon, it seems, lawyers who represent suspects in terrorism-related investigations complain that their ability to do their jobs is being hindered by the suspicion that the government is listening in, using the eavesdropping authority it obtained — or granted itself — after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

There are all kinds of issues in play here, not the least of which is the creepy fact that the government is able to violate lawyer-client privilege by snooping on their communications. But there’s an unspoken aspect to it: what about all of the carbon being produced by the constant unnecessary flights? Oregon to Saudi Arabia is a very long trip – and as the article suggests, Nelson isn’t the only one making frequent flights like this. I can only imagine how large this guy’s carbon footprint is. It’s stupid and definitely bad for the earth…

Link [New York Times]

Photo credit: Karl Dolenc

‘Green’ Celebs Sting & Trudi Admit They’re Not Doing So Great on the Carbon Footprint Front

Environmental experts recently rated Sting’s band, The Police, as the ‘dirtiest in the world’ based on the amount of pollution they generated on their most recent world tour. Yet, Sting and his wife, Trudi Styler, are vocal advocates of awareness about climate change and CO2 emissions. Hypocrites much? Yep, and they admit it, which is the refreshing part. While some celebrities would try to explain it all away, this couple says they know they’re a part of the problem.

Ecorazzi has it:

“Miss Styler tried to shift a little of the blame on to her musician husband, who is 56. ‘When it comes to the carbon footprint, Sting puts his hand up immediately and says ‘I’m a musician and I have a huge carbon-footprint’, she said. She then asked: ‘Are we being hypocritical?’ before seeming to answer the question herself. ‘He has a 750-person crew to bring around the world and it is a difficult challenge. I would like to think that we both work pretty hard for the rights of indigenous people and for the rights of conservation of the Amazon rainforest, but we do need to get around. It’s a difficult one.’”

Styler herself often flies around in private jets and helicopters, and is known for one incident in which she flew a private chef 100 miles just to make her a bowl of pasta.

Michael at Ecorazzi made a good point when he noted that Sting and Trudi would be better off sticking to charitable contributions than preaching about sustainability, since saying one thing and doing another isn’t going to get them any brownie points. My question is, why not cut back? No doubt, with the amount of money these two have, they could afford to make some big changes. While it’s great that they’re willing to admit to their flaws, the pasta incident alone shows they have a long way to go before they could ever be considered ‘green’ role models.

Link [Ecorazzi]

Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons

EarthFirst Blog Week in Review April 7-11

It’s okay to stare. We love the attention. And we KNOW you noticed our sexy new look. Now wipe up that drool pool on your desk and read us for our articles. We have some great stuff for you this week like a hockeyplaying bear, a video visit to that huge mass of plastic trash out in the pacific we’ve been talking so much about, and defrosting disease-ridden dead people! So, if for any odd reason you’ve been able to take your eyes off us at any time during the past few days, take a peek at our stuff again just for fun.

• Confessions of A Greenwasher: Like an AA Meeting, but with More Guilt
• Gather ‘Round the Festivus Pole, George Costanza’s Getting on the Green Team!
• Bored Japanese Guy + Recycled Chopsticks = Awesome Green Canoe
• Disease Infected Corpses Popping Up Through the Tundra, Courtesy of Global Warming
• Seattle Moves to Tear Down the Squirrelman’s Beautiful Waterfront Treehouse
• Common Sense Breaks Out: Car Buyers Dump Their SUVs for the Smallest Cars
• 
• Calculate your Carbon Footprint the Easy Way
• Watch Al Gore’s Awesomely Updated Slideshow from TED: The Urgency of Manbearpig
• Because You Can Train Bears to Do Just About Anything: The Hockey Edition
• Brilliant! Drought-Stricken Florida Gives Nestle Unlimited Water for $230
• It’s Mind Blowing Time: VBS.TV Visits the Garbage Filled Pacific Ocean Gyre
• Home Refrigeration 2.0- The Oceania Refrigerator Brings The Sexy Green Noise
• Axis of Corporate Evil: Taco Bell, Wal-Mart, and the NRA Hired Black Ops Private Security Team to Spy on Green Activists

When Kenyan Greenbeans Are Better: Why Local Food Isn’t Always The Best Choice

For Mike Small’s family in Fife, Scotland, it’s all about the local ingredients. For the past six months, the Smalls have been dining only on foods and beverages that come from within their home district. That means that on any given evening, the Smalls sit down to a combination of meats like fish, pork and lamb and local veggies such as parsnips, beetroots, kale, potatoes, leeks and other root vegetables. As long as it’s local, the Smalls are down with it.

While it sounds like the Smalls are making big leaps towards reducing their own carbon fooprints, turns out it just ain’t that easy. There are so many factors involved in the production and distribution of produce that it does not suffice to simply “eat what’s local” and assume that the impact that you are making is significant. Here are some reasons why:

• Food grown in areas where fertilizers and tractors are used is hardly carbon-friendly
• Many developing countries that export produce don’t use machinery and use cow crap for fertilizer, which means that even after air-freighting occurs, the carbon impact is less than it may be on a local, diesel-driven farm
• Purchasing local ingredients that are naturally dried instead of cooked and ready (chickpeas, for example) doesn’t mean you’re saving energy - you’ve still got to take them home and cook them, something that emits more carbon when done in small batches than when done in large ones
• Storing locally grown products that are not available year-round requires refrigeration, which emits carbon. Importing seasonal produce from where it is grown, even when done so via air-freight, is often more environmentally friendly than storage.

“The concept of food miles is unhelpful and stupid. It doesn’t inform about anything except the distance travelled.” — Dr Adrian Williams, of the National Resources Management Centre at Cranfield University.

Link [The Guardian]

Paris Hilton, Like, Totally Goes Green by Buying Yukon Hybrid. That’s Hot.

Hey, lookie here- Paris Hilton is going green.

Well, maybe not totally Green.

OK, she’s not anywhere near green. She’s about as far from Green as you can possibly get.

She bought a GMC Yukon Hybrid. It gets a whopping 21mpg in the city (Paris doesn’t do anything but city driving I’m guessing), holds eight people, and is the size of a small tank.

Paris has one hybrid SUV in her fleet of otherwise very un-hybrid cars, trucks, powerboats, giant houses, and jets. Big whooptyfreakingdoo. One of the most un-green people on the planet got a hybrid. Call me when she “forgets” to wear underwear again. Here’s the video:

Link [AutoblogGreen] via Ecorazzi

Low Carbon Man Lives Like a Homeless Bum for the Environment

Environmentalists have a hard enough time convincing the world that we’re not a bunch of dirty tree hugging hippies without guys like Ben Clowney, aka Fair Trade Man, aka Low Carbon Man, mucking it up for us.

Ben first got on the green radar with his bid to eat only Fair Trade food for two weeks. Now he’s living in a tent in the parking lot of his office and taken the new name of Low Carbon Man. His goal to to cut his carbon footprint by 95% by living in the tent and using wind up electronics for communicating. Basically, he’s living like a homeless bum.

I don’t think his example is what we need to be celebrating. Of course someone can cut their carbon footprint by living in a tent down by the river for a few weeks. That’s not a challenge that most of us can and will take up. We need to show people how they can live in real houses with heat and electricity and running water without destroying the earth to do it. Low Carbon Man is just muddying the green waters with his homeless antics.

Link [Treehugger]