Green Technology/Green Living

It should go without saying that our world is something we need to take (better) care of and I’ve been excited lately to see a gradual shift toward greener living in mainstream America.  But lately I’ve begun to believe that many of the “green” advances we’ve made are little more than superficial shifts that allow us to become complacent while environmental problems continue to worsen.  In other words, just because we can say that our society is a little bit “greener” today, we’re not really addressing the source of our problems. 

 

Probably the most salient example of America making superficial changes while ignoring the real problems is hybrid cars.  Like many people, I think hybrids are great and if at some point I have to buy a new car it’ll be a hybrid (though hopefully something even better will come along soon).  Still, hybrids are cars.  They produce destructive, if fewer, emissions.  In reality, even if we all drove 100 percent electric cars there would still be emissions from the manufacturing processes and from the power plants that charge the cars.  So, in the end, the problem is absolutely not that our cars are producing emissions; it’s that we’re driving cars in the first place.

 

Of course manufacturing anything produces waste, but imagine if everyone spent their time and money buying bicycles or good walking shoes instead of cars.  The amount of waste that we produce would go down dramatically (not to mention the fact that everyone would be a lot healthier).  Unfortunately, however, few Americans live close enough to anything to make walking or biking practical modes of transportation.  This means that the real environmental problem isn’t that we’re driving clunkers or SUVs (though we should get those vehicles off the roads too), but that we’ve spread ourselves out in such a way that we’re required to pollute to get anywhere.  In essence, the issue is the layout of our cities and the composition of our neighborhoods, not the miles per gallon we get in our cars.  What’s more, if it’s our cities that are forcing us to drive so much, it’s our underlying cultural and ideological assumptions that allow our cities to exist the way they do.  So change has to begin with a radical reassessment of these underlying assumptions.   

 

The problem with hybrids is that they’ve become an excuse to ignore this radical change.  They allow us to sidestep questions about the ethics of commuting, suburban and sub-suburban city planning, and a whole score of other issues that sit much closer to the source of our environmental problems.  When we drive a hybrid we’re doing our part and we feel like we’ve answered those questions.  The problem is that in reality, we haven’t even begun to ask them. 

 

Hybrid cars are simply one example of green technology distracting us from actually living green lives.  There are many others.  Finally, however, if we actually want to make a difference we need to reevaluate not only the type of engine we want in our car, but also the underpinnings of our society.  We need to take a holistic approach to improving our lifestyles.  We need a paradigm shift.