Environmentally Speaking - Are We Doing More Harm Than Good?

We are becoming more aware of what pollutes our earth and how we can begin to help the problem but at what cost? I recently found out a few things that have made me ask the question, In our quest to try new innovations are we actually making matters worse?

For example, consider the new Hybrid cars. Batteries that contain nickle are used to run them. The nickel is mined and causes terrible environmental damage for miles surrounding the plant, where it is produced.The nickel is shipped around the world to cause more damage. The cost of building Hybrids are also twice as much as the Hummer. When you equate all this information in, the Chevy Aveo beats out the Hybrid for omissions. It also costs less then half of what a Hybrid does.

What about our need for Organic foods? While Organic foods are more healthy, at the same time they do cost more to produce and they have a longer growing period. Some of the crop is sure to be destroyed by the lack of pesticides. Since Organically grown food takes so long to grow and is difficult to grow, it drives up the prices at supermarket. This drives up transportation and fuel costs also. I personally cannot afford to buy Organic.

Organic meats are very expensive. Often they are double the price of any other meat product and rightfully so. I raise beef cattle and I never try to use medicated feeds. However, the unmedicated feed which they require to be classified as "Organic" costs twice as much as the regular feed. We are sometimes forced to use the medicated because we could not afford the non medicated at the time. That doesn't happen very often because we do not have that many cows but if every farmer in America went Organic, the cost would incredible to him and the environment. It would actually take longer to grow the beef to weight and the farmer would lose money. With no antibiotic, the farmer would also lose a percentage of live stock to disease. This also drives up costs for transporting the meat.

We hear so much about trees and how helpful they are to us and that is true but what about when a tree hits a certain age? At 150 years old, a tree slows down storing carbon. As it continues to get older it slows down even more. When it dies of old age and starts to decay and rot, it actually puts the carbon back into the air. So instead of not cutting down the trees, we need to farm them.

In many ways we have made strides in reducing pollutants. I am also not saying that any step toward a cleaner earth is not a good thing but in doing so we have to make completely sure that we aren't doing more harm then good.