Boycott blogs? Viewing the average web page creates 50% more emission

[LSW]

Yep, Harvard physicist Alex Wissner-Gross has found that 20 mgs of carbon dioxide is released onto the atmosphere for every second that an average website is viewed. This includes the energy used both on the surfer's end and the web site's end (all the computers, networks, etc. that are involved in viewing an average site). This is actually 50 percent MORE than the amount of green house gases emitted when a human exhales.

 

When a British newspaper cited his findings, Google had a hissy fit even though they were not mentioned. Because it's web site is so massive and gets so many hits. Google's "footprint" is probably in the hundreds of thousands of pounds of green house gases per month range (based on ~200 million searches per day). Google claims it takes 1000 searches to equal the greenhouse gas emissions generated by an average car driving one kilometer.

 

Note that streaming a video, etc. creates a whole lot MORE greenhouse gas than viewing normal web pages. Downloading 1000 megs of data is the equivalent of burning a 10 lb bag of charcoal.

 

More gas for thought:

 

In 2007, Gartner Research found that the global IT industry generated about the same amount of greenhouse gases as the airline industry - about 2 percent of global emissions.

[Wickham]

...............but the alternative ways of doing research by going to a library or writing letters or going to a bar and asking someone would create a huge amount more greenhouse gas :/

[lwsimon]

What a load.

 

First, CO2 has not been proven to be a "greenhouse gas" There are lots of fancy charts that show this, and lots of researchers that will tell you that it is, but there is not a single reproducible study that shows that CO2 in the atmosphere increases the surface temperature.

 

Second, even assuming the above is false, this is incredibly flawed. There are so many variables, it isn't even funny. What load was the server under? How many hops from the PC to the server? What was the thermostat set at in the network closet of the ISP? What O/S were they using?

 

I'm quite sick and tired of hearing these "studies" like they are actual science. They are nothing more than a bunch of ideologues doing "study" after "study", until they find a dataset that supports their conclusions, publishing it, and discarding the rest.

 

100 years from now, this will be looked upon as a classic case of mass hysteria. The textbooks will show "global warming" right next to the "Salem witch trails".

[Andrea]

Besides, every so often, I come across a site that is either coded very poorly or just looks like cr@p - and that takes my breath away and shuts me up for a minute - so I have zero carbon dioxide emissions during that time which helps to balance things overall.

[falkencreative]

Besides, every so often, I come across a site that is either coded very poorly or just looks like cr@p - and that takes my breath away and shuts me up for a minute - so I have zero carbon dioxide emissions during that time which helps to balance things overall.

 

[lwsimon]

Besides, every so often, I come across a site that is either coded very poorly or just looks like cr@p - and that takes my breath away and shuts me up for a minute - so I have zero carbon dioxide emissions during that time which helps to balance things overall.

 

This, however, is absolute truth.

[administrator]

If you're going to go down that road, you should stop eating meat because the greenhouse gases produced by beef is far greater than that of automobiles.

 

Yes, all the cows in the world fart out more global warming gases than all the trucks, cars and jets combined.

 

... Or so I've read.

 

-

 

Personally, I don't drive a car and use my bike instead. For that reason alone, I should have so many carbon points saved up ... that I should have a card/license that allows me to litter anywhere I like!

 

 

Stefan

[LSW]

I just thought it was funny! My take on it was that so many blogs are just people who like to hear themselves type... there is more than green house gasses in the air. "This is my brother, we went shopping, I bought shoes, he bought a shirt that was just soooooo, like icky..."

 

Guess I should have placed it is Quotes so it did not look like i wrote it. I drive a SUV and if you don't like it folks... come live in Alaska.

 

I tried to ride the native wild life like they do horses, ostrages and Cammels... but Black bears are grumpy and so short my feet dragged on the ground. Now I sit crooked after he bit off one of my cheeks.

[Andrea]

... but Black bears are grumpy and so short my feet dragged on the ground.

Same thing happened to me with the armadillos down here...

[DesignBySLS]

I drive a car... And I read blogs... I am going to hell for it I tell ya!

 

Thank you for the giggles in this thread... you all made me laugh on this one!

[lwsimon]

The hot air produced by all the bloggers would be far more detrimental than any other affect this may have.

[LSW]

Speaking of hot air, Saturday, middle of Jan in Alaska and we hit a high of 54 degrees. People were out in T-Shirts! Our three feet of snow has lowered as fast as it came. !!! We went wail watching, it was wonderful... but that big bright round thing in the sky was blinding... wonder where it came from.