LOG CABIN CHRONICLES Hydro-Québec "green-washes" its new fridge campaign
Posted
03.21.13 That's a skimpy argument, and the campaign leaves
innumerable questions unanswered. Without a few of these answers,
the replace-your-fridge promotion should be recognized by the public as,
frankly, a scam. This campaign actually looks like it will cause more
environmental stress and pollution, not less. First, Hydro is asking
us to discard our old appliances. How is that done? Dumped on the curb,
or traded in to appliance shops? Where will the carcasses of all those
old machines end up? What's "green" in dumping thousands of
working appliances into landfills, before or after they've been
stripped? Hydro has to tell us what is the end location of all those
old (but working) fridges? And add a note about recycling the freon, or
any newer refrigerant gas, please. Second, Hydro has calculated the
future savings of the new machines -- could we see those studies? Are
the fridges really so efficient to justify a big-ticket purchase and a
big-dump into the landfills? Until we have proof of efficiency, why
would we believe Hydro any more than believe the auto makers who insist
their new cars are so much more efficient, when, in fact, most km/litre
estimates are only slightly better than way back in the 1970s?
Third, when Hydro calculates the savings in operating a new fridge, are
they calculating into their numbers all the energy and resources used to
build those new fridges? I'm betting they haven't, and it's a little
scary to think of what it is costing in emissions, energy use, and
resources to build thousands of new fridges. Put those figures into your
promotion, Hydro-Québec! Fourth, is the energy used and the
emissions created in transporting the new and old appliances to the
stores and homes, and to the recycling and landfill facilities, also
calculated into the equation? Why not? Fifth, we might wonder where
these new, efficient appliances are being built. Is Hydro Quebec
shilling for China? What are the costs of that to our economy and our
jobs? And when China destroys its own air quality it is destroying our
air quality, since air has few boundaries. Is Hydro-Quebec actually
supporting China's lack of environmental protection, not to mention its
lack of protection for its working people? So far, it looks like it.
Folks, the savings in daily energy use with a new fridge will have to be
phenomenal, not marginal, to justify all these other costs, which appear
to be left out of the calculations. It's great to save a few bucks and
nice to have a shiny new fridge, but Hydro-Quebec shouldn't flog this as
"green" until it's proven to be so. At present there is
absolutely no proof on paper to back up these efficiency claims.
One final and touchy final question is why is this campaign not open
to anglophones in Quebec? I have only seen it promoted in
French, in unilingual French media. Is that proper? I hope my
observations are due to my own short-sightedness, not the result of an
ugly marketing decision by Hydro's agents. Until these questions are
answered, we're being sold a bill of goods, under the banner of being
"green". We expect much more of Hydro-Québec.
Copyright © 2013 Fred Ryan/Log Cabin Chronicles/03.13 |