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Greenpeace: Amazon Fire Burns More Coal and Gas Than It Should
Jason Koebler (3528235) writes "The biggest thing that sets the Amazon Fire Phone apart from its Android and Apple competitors probably isn't the clean interface or the unlimited photo storage—it's the dirty power behind it. When Fire users upload their photos and data to Amazon's cloud, they'll be creating a lot more pollution than iPhone owners, Greenpeace says. Apple has made a commitment to running its iCloud on 100 percent clean energy. Amazon, meanwhile, operates the dirtiest servers of any major tech giant that operates its own servers—only 15 percent of its energy comes from clean sources, which is about the default national average." Greenpeace's jaundiced eye is on Amazon more generally; the company's new phone is just an example. Maybe Amazon or some other provider could take a page from some local utilities and let users signal their own preferences with a (surcharged) "clean energy" option.
This whole "I buy my energy from green sources" crap is hipsterism at its finest. It's even more hipster than goddamn "walled garden" cell phones with unusable flat UIs, glasses with no lenses, and fedora hats.
It represents everything that's fucked up about hipsters and their toxic attitude:
1) They think they're "making a difference" without actually doing anything beneficial at all.
2) They brag about how they're "making a difference", when they obviously aren't.
3) They feel good about how they're "making a difference", when they haven't done a goddamn thing.
4) They think they care about the environment, when they clearly don't.
5) They subject the rest of us to their "environmental justice" and "social justice" crap without end.
These hipsters make me sick. Give me back the hippies of the 1960s, or the real environmentalists of the 1970s! As obnoxious as they often were, at least they weren't filthy hypocrites like today's hipsters are. They actually managed to practice what they preached, even if they were out of touch with reality. Hipsters today are totally out of touch, and can't even be assed to live by how they say everyone should should be living.
It loses all credibility. perhaps its true, but once they make a claim i almost always assume that its another exaggeration or outright lie.
I don't hate the environment, i just don't believe anything those idealistic eco hippies say.
They use 100% organic whale oil - a fully renewable fuel!
I support Apple's initiatives and I'm glad they're setting a good example as an industry leader. However, I could not possibly care less that a given cell phone might be accessing a server that isn't "green". Yes, Amazon Fire will be running "on top of" AWS. This is an absolute given. It will also be leaning on servers from Google, Apple, Rackspace, and Joe's Server Shack.
Greenpeace, shoo. You're not involved in these discussions and you're not relevant to the task at hand. It's cute that you want to be a part of the conversation, but this is the adult table.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Give me back the hippies of the 1960s, or the real environmentalists of the 1970s! As obnoxious as they often were, ....
It's a shame with all this hostility towards environmentalists.
They were the ones who pushed for cleaner air and water. They were the ones who helped get lead out of gasoline.
If it weren't for them, we'd have the environment of China because businesses do not care. Pollution is the tradgedy of the commons - folks pollute and the rest of society pays for the costs.
During the Summer here in coal powered Metro Atlanta, air quality gets so bad that it kills suseptable young children and the elderly.
But use cleaner and more expensive energy?! Fuck no!
Gotta power all those Chinese made electronic gadgets - especially the big screen TV plugged into the overpriced cable because we gotta have our sports!
And of course there are the gas guzzling SUVs and "manly" pickup trucks - many driven by "No-noes" (folks who drive a truck just to be manly and NEVER actually use it to haul anything). Oh no! Cannot look like a fag driving something a bit more sensible and perfectly adequate with 4 cyclinders.
But I actually walk the walk - and I save a shit load of money.
That's right. Living "green" is CHEAP!
Cheaper cars, lower fuel expenses, no cable bill, no expensive cell phone bills because I don't have a smart phone, cheaper electricity because I don't have a TV in every room or any other energy sucking toys.
I walk to local stores - they're less than half a mile away. See, being "green" also saves money on exercise. Why pay hundreds of dollars and get locked into a shitty gym contract when walking and carrying packages is great exercise?
Much our polution is because of our insane consumerist culture. Buy, buy, buy! Spend money! Go into debt! Sign away your freedom and enslave ourselves with debt because we gotta have those electronic toys, big trucks, cable TV, etc ...
If we learned to live simpler and deeper, we'd be much happier as a society and things would clean up on their own because we would spend time doing important things instead of wasting it on shit doing shit.
Last time they ranked Amazon poorly for datacenter power, I checked some numbers and compared with other agencies rankings.
Amazon got about 27% of it's power from nuclear.
No CO2, but Greenpeace didn't credit anything for it.
Dell's datacenters had higher CO2 emissions, only ~7% nuclear, but a little more renewables.
The anti-nuclear geniuses at Greenpeace gave Dell a cleaner ranking than Amazon.
They only credit CO2 abatement, if they agree with the method.
Not only that, they don't even MENTION all CO2 abatements.
In fact, I found that Amazon's emissions were far better than average.
I think they had the 2nd lowest fossil generating share of about 10 US datacenter operators compared.
In addition, Amazon was investing heavily in PSU, rack density, and cooling improvements, and virtualization is a known resource saver across all components. Ever heard of virtualization at Amazon?
I doubt that anyone at Greenpeace understands any of this.
Any electrical engineers there? HVAC engineers? POWERPLANT engineers?
Greenpeace are dishonest, technically ignorant, and thoroughly foolhardy;
and will destroy your World if you let them.
TFA shouldn't have even been posted here.
-- Mike Greaves
Here you go. Greenpeace exec commuting on commercial air every week between Amsterdam and Luxembourg. Until he was shamed, then made it every other week.
http://www.nltimes.nl/2014/06/24/greenpeace-director-hypocrisy-scandal-takes-plane-work/
Staff revolts
http://www.nltimes.nl/2014/07/23/greenpeace-staff-want-director-dismissed/
See, like most liberal assholes, it is do as i say not as I do. Anyone who give Greenpeace another nickel is a fool.
Here you go. Greenpeace exec commuting on commercial air every week between Amsterdam and Luxembourg.
That was not a "private jet". Adding yet-another-passenger to a commercial flight emits about as much CO2 as driving the same distance. How far is it from Amsterdam to Luxembourg anyway?
See, like most liberal assholes, it is do as i say not as I do.
That is a dumb standard. You should do what someone says, or not, depending on whether their argument makes sense. That they are hypocrites is irrelevant. In this case, Greenpeace's argument is silly. Electricity is fungible, and it doesn't really mean anything to say that the source of power for one particular use is "clean". All that really matters is the overall emissions. But even that is silly, since subsidizing clean energy is a pretty dumb way to combat global warming. A far better way to reduce CO2 emissions would be to buy condoms for Nigerians. People that are never born emit far less CO2 than those that are. Long term problems require long term solutions.