by asdf
Fri Nov 17th, 2006 at 01:14:05 AM EST
Britain's Prince Charles has decided to turn over a new leaf and become the Green Prince. Good for him!
Prince Charles has told some of his staff to use bicycles in the fight against global warming. He is even prepared to travel to London by commuter train from a station near Highgrove. Charles wants to be remembered as the "Green Prince" and is making a personal statement by planning a radical shake-up of his travel plans.
He intends to make more use of the royal train and has ordered his chauffeurs to leave their cars behind and travel by bicycle when they check arrangements ahead of his appointments in London. Charles has also told aides to find a more environmentally friendly fuel for his fleet of cars.
[ThisIsLondon]
What should his carbon footprint look like?
For that matter, what should our own carbon footprints look like?
Our fearless leader Jerome (not pictured above) recently increased his personal carbon footprint substantially by taking an extended round-the-world airplane trip. Those of us fortunate enough to live in the West make a huge contribution to the total greenhouse gas load on our planet--some of us more than others. Particularly we nasty Americans. :-)
And there are a bunch of Third World people whose entire contribution to the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is the result of heating a can of <whatever it is that you eat when you make $10 per month> and maybe a cigarette and the electricity generation contribution for their radio.
There's quite a range here, but where should right-thinking Westerners try to align themselves? Do we try to get down to the one-lukewarm-can-of-beans-per-day level? "Reduce" to Charles's level and only drive our Aston Martins on alternate weekends?
Vote for your option in annual metric tons of CO2 per capita. Data from Wikipedia
