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Saturday, October 03, 2009

The green factor!

Green has become a fancy and a trendy term, the humankind is not kind enough to accept; that being green is an essential thing. If it wasn't the case, then it wouldn't be hard for a car manufacturer to push his green car, a computer system manufacturer need not push his green products. It is quite evident that we as a human race for the most part have not understood our responsibilities completely. Well said in the movie Spiderman "With great powers comes great responsibilities". So what have we missed here? We missed to realize that, being green and embracing green is not just about being trendy but it is about being supportive to mother nature.

To me striving towards green is something everyone needs to think about and embrace any such efforts. I feel it silly when companies fight for the green ranking - greenrankings.
These companies have to advertise people encouraging the move towards green products. When I say this, I understand that any producer should advertise the greenness of a product for people to choose the right one. But it is almost that the producers are taking these efforts to pursue their customers to move towards green, that's bothering; because we are in a situation of explaining what can green do to us and we do not get it unless otherwise told. I am also forced to think that we failed to think about this for a very long time and now we realize the impacts after reaching the tipping point. This is also not just true from the consumer standpoint, but from the producers as well. It makes sense, if the green rankings are helping the companies now; to think about making greener products.

On the other front, being green is not just about making and buying green products, but it is also about reducing the day today waste we generate. I could not stop to quote an incident that happened today, just while I was writing this blog.

I raised a maintenance request to change the toilet seat cover, to my apartment office, as the seat cover was broken. The maintenance guy brought a brand new seat cover and replaced it. I was wondering why didn't he just replace the bolt, which was causing the issue. I could not stop but ask him, wouldn't fixing the bolt put the seat in it's position and why do you have to change the seat cover completely? For which he answered it is easy for him to find a brand new seat cover instead of the appropriate bolt and also the seat cover costs less, like $7 and it is not a big deal. I was telling him that, so the old seat cover would just end up being in trash and not re-usable anymore. The maintenance guy also made a point, that his employer values his time more than worrying about the waste that his job generates. He was right, we do not value other things as much as we value time. We underestimate the impact, we are causing to the environment by blaming the loss of time. We failed to value that we must be responsible in our actions for the things; that does matter not just to us but to the environment as well. We must realize that there are other critical things that are as much valuable as time, if not for more.

So it is time for us to think of our responsibilities. For those who are already embracing green and feeling proud and trendy about it, I have one thing to say, folks I appreciate that you are doing good, but there is nothing here in feeling proud or trendy, it is simply your responsibility. If you want to feel proud then do spread the green awareness and our responsibilities for nature.

Let's make the blue planet more greener!

3 comments:

Rajiram said...

Hey u r awesome honey! what a man u r? - a man with social responsibility! u r ecofriendly.....etc. u r extraordinary - i ought to post a comment here, not bcoz u r my husband!!!
U R A MAN OF GREAT THOUGHTS! when u were telling me about ur concern for ecofriendly environment - this happnd, when u came to chennai - do u remember? u were very particular in throwing the waste papers, empty pepsi cans... only in the dustbin! i was thinking, ok this guy is trying to act too smart??!!
i was wrong!

now, after reading ur "green" topic in ur blog; man let me tell u, i am gone out of the world; thinking of this GENTLEMAN!
I now understood, ur words meaning; ATTITUDE dude! i really understood!
I AM BLESSED TO HAVE A HUSBAND LIKE U! - i really mean it, my honey!

hereafter, will take care of ur views and will try by all means to match this great gentleman - Mr. Karthik, u r rocking!

---------------- treat as a comment from one of ur best and greatest fans ever
----with love,
rajiram

Babu said...

Most of the times, when it comes to investing in green we think about ROI. If someone wants to buy a Toyota-Prius, he has to spend six grands more than buying a non-hybrid car.
General attitude is to think, how long it takes to get the extra six grand by saving from gas. This is more than just saving on gas bill, it is about saving the environment, reducing country's trade deficit, etc.,

Cost is the main reason and developing countries in particular, (India and Brazil) are not ready to adapt greener energy as that will hurt the companies profit margin and hence the countries GDP growth.

Ram said...

I agree that cost is a factor, but who decides cost?

Cost is defined by us, probably attributed by "demand and supply" and again that's up to us.

You made a very good point on the attitude.

I would bet Toyota makes profit by saying you save X gallons of gas and guess what, you also help the environment. If it were the reverse, say, you save the environment at the cost of saving X gallons of gas then I think the cost would have gone down...