danpascooch said:
Treblaine said:
danpascooch said:
Tenmar said:
I'm sorry but I always have to ask myself this question when I see Greenpeace make reports like this.
What exactly is it about the video game consoles that make you think they output more pollution than other companies products?
Seriously let's think about this because the standby mode started with the PS2 and it is only until this generation that all three consoles had a standby mode. Also think about the amount of energy these consoles use compared to the energy of desktop computers? I really don't think Greenpeace actually did a proper study to determine the power output of these consoles compared to other computer electronics.
Also aren't video game consoles sorta in their own class? Why are they being compared to both computer and cell phone companies? So there is quite a bit of data fudging since they aren't willing to isolate each product.
Also the problem I have with greenpeace is that while they look like the proper hippie that got serious about the issue they are still advocating upon the most pointless issues to protest against corporations instead of creating proper solutions and new energy sources.
It's not all about energy consumption, but the number of toxic materials used in the consoles. Pretty much all of the consoles will eventually end up in a landfill, so it is a little important.
Show me the person stupid enough to throw a SNES or ANY games console in a landfill and I'll show then how to make an ebay account.
Consoles just don't get thrown away, they are used, repaired, stay in a box in the attic or are sold on if not wanted. They are not disposable items.
And even then the arsenic and other heavy metals in these consoles could only possibly get into the environment if they were Burned and THEN washed into the water supply. And even THEN it is not like nature itself isn't particularly good at shitting up natural mercury and arsenic into water supplies. They aren't artificial elements, they came from nature.
But you know the BIGGEST source of anthropomorphic mercury into the environment? Energy saving fluorescent lightbulbs, the type that Greenpeace had been lobbying to make mandatory and even BAN conventional incandescent lightbulbs which are utterly inert and harmless in the environment.
At some point those consoles will break, and go out of demand, and at some point they WILL end up in a landfill, saying "I'll show them ebay" is like saying "I'll get health insurance" sure, it can delay death, but at some point you WILL die, it's just a fact.
Consoles should last at least a decade with proper use and occasional repairs (or 2 decades, with Nintendo consoles) where they can then be recycled or salvaged for precious metals. Both do a great job of preventing poisonous metals ending up in the environment. I think we can manage that. Individual responsibility, take your broken console to be properly recycled, don't place ridiculous and pointless limits on a stressed industry.
I mean jebus christ, we aren't talking nuclear waste here, but a single device that a minority of the population of the world buys only every 5 years or so. Heavy metals from ALL electronic circuitry amount to less that a drop in the ocean compared to the HUGE problem that Greenpeace itself has CAUSED by advocating fluorescent lighting completely replace incandescent lighting.
Another huge heavy-metal-poison problem made worse by Greenpeace is their opposition to nuclear power, the only technology that is mature and deployable enough to replace coal power. See burning coal releases millions of tones of vaporised mercury into the atmosphere. Hell, you'd be surprised at the amount of dangerous radio-isotopes released by mass burning of coal, makes nuclear power seem far more suitable.
