I'm positive that just about everyone has heard about global warming and the deadly effects it will have on future generations. We've all seen the scientific facts - the photos of the melting North Pole and rising water levels - NASA even announced that October 2008 was the hottest October ever recorded. The world has replied in a bold way. Just about everywhere we look, green energy, green fuel, and even green computing is easily found.
Green energy has taken the world by storm. Coal power plants of the 20th century are now seen as the number one threat to the world. The focus is now on squeezing every single watt out of renewable energy. While global warming is a real and serious issue, it sometimes occurs to me that half of the developments made in renewable energy are just fictional concepts. Solar panels are one thing, but solar grass which can be planted everywhere is another. Hawaii is building wave-farms off-shore, with many other coastal regions soon getting their own implementations. There are even ideas to turn Japanese subway turnstiles into electricity generating machines. While the ideas are great, not many of them are cost and time effective.
Alternate fuel has also taken off and continues to become more popular. Those large, gas-guzzling SUVs and pickups getting 15 miles per gallon are now targets of activist groups as ethanol (E-85), electric, hybrid, hydrogen fuel cell, and even concepts of bacteria-powered (I don't know the details) cars are becoming a reality. Once again, all of these alternate fuels are great and promise to end global warming, but are impractical. Honda, developer of the hydrogen Accord is only deploying a small batch in California, which already has filling stations unlike much of the world. Implementation of these alternate fuels will also have to be checked and done so it can be cost-effective - which is why the concept fuels of today might turn out just like concept cars - a fantasy.
Green computing is something that really took me by surprise. Originally, I planned to put my computer into standby more often or hibernating, but entire product lines aiming for lowest power consumption have been introduced. Western Digital has a line of GreenPower hard drives. In the web-hosting community, green hosting is becoming popular too. Netbooks are also pushing green power in a subliminal way - companies are pitching netbooks as tools for e-mail and light browsing and effectively saying that you don't need a 3.06GHz Quad-core processor. Are the drives and netbooks cost-effective? For some people, netbooks might really be all they need, other might need the extra horsepower of a multicore processor. The RPM and read/write speed conscious might not find GreenPower drives to yield great performance, but casual users might find them to be sufficient.
Green-ness is a revolution in collaboration and people working together for a common cause, but it needs to stay in check. But, in my opinion, pulling every single watt of energy out of everywhere might be over-hyped and just as ineffective as not being green at all. So, before you build a glass greenhouse (no pun intended) to live in, make sure your stones don't break it.
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