Where in the World is the Green in That?

Gabrielle — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 03:46:09 +0000

I love the fact that “Going Green” is all the rage. The bandwagon is huge – room enough for everyone! The more the merrier, I say. I love that businesses, companies (small and large, including the one that employs me) are all clamoring to say, “hey, look at us! We are green!”

I can certainly think of suckier trends. And I really hope this one lasts long enough to make an impact. It has to.

What makes me a little nutty is when someone’s “going green” logo is right over a story/fact/issue that contradicts it. Say, for example, my boss’s bad habit of wanting priority emails printed out so she won’t forget to address them, or, something on a much larger scale like, oh, I dunno, Matt Lauer jetting around the world in the midst of NBC and its Today Show’s claiming they are “Going Green.”

Now on his ninth Where in the World trip, Fox reports:

Lauer has logged 210,721 miles on his trips, turning up at the base of Mount Everest, by the Pyramids in Egypt, at the casinos of Monte Carlo and at the Taj Mahal in India.

Taking trains, plains, boats, helicopters, you name it, to get around while he is wherever he is. Holy carbon footprint, Carmen!

Wondering what Matt’s latest jaunt equals in terms of a carbon footprint and environmental impact? Put away your calculators, Kevin at Pundit Review has done the math for us:

In the first two days of his five day tour, Matt has used up 9.196 tons of CO2. The average American emits 9.44 tons of CO2 PER YEAR.

So, with this in mind, is there any end in sight for our intrepid traveler? He says no:

“There will be a time when I say it’s a nice time to draw it to a close, but at the moment I’m not going to do it,” he said. “The nice thing is I have a lot of say over where I get to go.”

How do you feel about The Today’s Show’s travels? Do the potential economic benefits of the tourism it hopes to promote outweigh the environmental impact?