Also, always remember that the greenest choice is almost always not to buy. Reducing and then reusing what you already have are far greener than buying a new "green" option. If you do need to buy, getting something used is greener than buying new. In all these cases, the vast majority of emissions and other pollution have already happened.
The "don't buy" choice is great. When I do buy, my lazy choice is to avoid anything liquid. Water is heavy and it takes a lot of energy to get those products to market. I buy dry and use boiled tap water when I can. Okay, that's a lie. I cheat sometimes, but mostly. My water philosophy is in denial about fruits and vegetables.
Sabine's ability to inform and clarify humiliates mainstream media organizations. How does she do that? I answer: first she thinks carefully, then she speaks her thoughts. So much needed today and always. Thanks, Sabine 👏👏👏
I think she's right in line with mainstream media. Talking about trans ppl. Saying fossil fuels are causing all our problems. Never giving an opposing view. In which there are many. I want both sides. Sabine is entertaining enough to watch. So I do.
@@andrewruiz7894"Both" sides? What both? Why are there only two sides? I can think of many different value systems. Not just two. And does "side" only include different values so that we come to different rational conclusions based on facts or do you want a "side" that articulates something different to a factual and rational consideration, too?
Sabine doesn't scream. I mean this literally and figuratively. She just speaks calmly and without emotional outbursts. It reminds me someone explaining rules of board game.
@@andrewruiz7894do you also want “both” sides’ opinion on earth’s shape maybe? Or maybe “both” sides’ opinion on some little mustache guy’s actions in 1930s Germany?
Apple may look good on that chart, but what that chart does not take into account is repair. Repairing most things, especially electronics, is always much more environmentally friendly than making a new one, even if the new one hypothetically was made from 100% recycled materials. Repair often uses just a tiny fraction of the materials and energy needed to manufacture a replacement of the entire device. Apple makes the repair of thier products unnecessarily hard by restricting replacement parts, schematics and software that are needed for repairs. Apples anti repair lobbying efforts damage repairability of many products beyond the Apple ecosystem.
Perhaps, even more important than the issue of repairs is the well established practice in the tech industry of the "programmed obsolescence" of their products.
My 20 year old original PowerBook still works. My 17 year old iMac still works. So go ahead and complain about repairs, but also consider life-time of products.
I explained my friends so many times, that organic and eco labels mean nothing(or very little). Nobody listens. I'm biotechnology engineer, I know biology and chemistry but noooo, yoga instructor knows better.
Yoga-instructor tells them what they want to hear; you (try to) tell them what they don't want to hear. Wizard's first rule (Terry Goodkind): People will believe a lie, either because they want it to be true or they fear it to be true. This falls in the first category. Now, do we have to become just as good at lying as the greenwashers or do we need to put the fear of science into the gullables..... And how do we do that last bit?
went to a business class with an orchard grower, she told us that eco and organic in her field meant that she just couldn't use around half of the *icides available.
In our particular case (Poland) it's much more religion classes at school than any other single science classes. And also a way of teaching, government interventions in education and so on. It is a very sad situation. @DreadX you said it nicely. We have to do the same what US did in 60ties - make science and education trendy. But that's a role of a wise government. To bet on development. A very difficult thing to do. Yet there is a hope still, because of people like Sabine and many other science educators. Let's hope that big business model of RUclips will not force them out of this platform.
In the EU at least, we have well enforced regulation about the criteria that organic labeled food/agriculture has to fulfill. And as far as I know EU-organic agriculture is significantly better for biodiversity and sustaining healty soil. Still not perfect, as some problematic stuff is not banned, but much better than conventional. The only critics I have heard about organic, is that it is not healthier and not better for the climate, but that's not what the organic label is for.
@@h-z1218 honestly my problem with whole eco/organic is price and quality. The nutritional value is most of the same(examples: eggs, root vegetables like carrot or callery), taste is just an opinion. Then eco/organic stuff is 50% more pricy or even more.
Sabine, THANK YOU for also guiding to a better approach! So many people just stop at the "pointless button", which is the worst consequence of greenwashing.
Sabine Hossenfelder is wonderful. There are additional, easy tips to remember if you want to contribute to an improved environment. Here are a few: ✦ Buy a better quality product that will last. Too many cheap things end up in the trash. ✦ Buy LED lighting fixtures; they require much less electricity to operate and are supposed to last a long time. ✦ Maintain optimal comfort at home in the space you use, not necessarily the entire house. A small ceramic heater, for example, is both efficient and safe. ✦ Learn about local recycling, and participate in the program. Learn which things they want and what will contaminate the recycling stream. ✦ Avoid packaging that isn't accepted for recycling. Around here for example, the local recycling operation has no buyers for styrene products, or for plastics without a recycling code number.
Most recycling streams flow into landfills. Glass is easy to recycle, but not cost effective. Most plastic can not be recycled and eventually ends up in the ocean.
"So it's a bottle of vacuum?" I wonder if anybody is selling 100% organic tablesalt. And what exactly it is they are actually selling. I also love when they put "vegan" labels on things that are naturally entirely made without animal parts. Like olive oil.
Oh man, I remember a few years ago seeing a screenshot of the comments section of a fb group promoting some kind of “natural” product and a clever young lady asked “does it contain _dihydrogen monoxide_ ?” To which the response was something to effect of: “No, absolutely NO chemicals.” I don’t know if that actually happened but still pretty good haha
I saw a "green" box of paperclips. It looked like plain carboard with black and green printing instead of the traditional red on white for office supplies in the US. When I opened it I saw that the inside was glossy white. By all appearances they'd just turned their boxes over, printed on the back, and assembled them inside out!
Apple as an example: They may present themselves as nice, but as long as the company prevents its products from being repaired, it is a good example to divert attention from the actual topic. Every defective device is replaced by a new one, which is a disaster considering the abundance of resources that are necessary for a smartphone and cannot be recycled. If an IPhone could be repaired instead, Apple would only need to produce two thirds of the IPhones, with the corresponding positive effects on the eco-balance, but nobody talks about that! But instead Apple builds a few wind turbines and does next level greenwashing . The next example at Apple would be the thing with the USBs. If they really took environmental protection seriously, they wouldn't have fought the EU regulation so hard. I don't want to claim that Apple's competitors are better. What always distinguishes Apple from the competition is that they present themselves better than they are in all aspects!
Apple is also a trendsetter for many anti repair "innovations" or for removing headphone jacks for example, requiring wireless headphones with hard to replace batteries of themselves. An iPhone 4 with an wired headphones used one battery. An iPhone 12 with AirPods uses three additional batteries, two for the ear pieces and one for the charging case and AirPod batteries are even harder to replace than that of the iPhone itself. And now other manufacturers are doing the same, causing further harm to the environment!
All true, repairability and fewer required batteries are important issues, but I‘d like to add that in my experience Apple products last very long. As the performance of consumer electronics has plateaued somewhat, Apple‘s long-term software support makes it possible to use the iPhones and iPads for five to six years, no problem. Computers even longer. In my family I see a quicker turnaround rate with Android devices. Of course you have to take care of your device (what the hell do people do to lightning cables?!) and yes, you can of course change an iPhone-battery at an Apple store - it‘s expensive, but still cheaper than buying a new phone of similar performance.
@@JonoConstantini Interesting, what kind of software issues is your family experiencing that make it necessary to replace the physical device? In theory, software, being digital, should not degrade like hardware does due to wear, if you don't change it. Updates that bloat the software and make a phone slower have been an issue, but that is an issue not unheard of with Apple.
@@JonoConstantini For older Android devices, there are third party operating systems solving the problem of lacking manufacturer updates. There's CalyxOS and LineageOS which offer up-to-date Android versions for older phones. It's genuine Android, so user experience is about the same. If you also care about your privacy, there are iodéOS and DivestOS. These are also based on Android, but parts sending your data to Google servers are removed. Which means, a few things stop working and need a different app. Which is the better choice depends on how much you value your privacy. The hardest part: making people recognize that one needs no new device just to get a new operating system. For many, hardware and OS are "the same".
@@aniksamiurrahman6365 Well, most plants won't be available for long or many generations without the animals who are pollinators. And even the dung of other animals support the microorganism in the soil which support the plants. So, maybe the fuss about the animals could be that they are part of the circle of life and maybe none of the components of this circle is "more important" ... just a thought.
You are the ONLY one who questions EVERYTHING about current affairs that's on my mind! I'm so glad for your work! Thank you 😊. I don't think it's worth consuming main stream media anymore, they aren't talking about the obvious subjects but try to distract us from what is really going on.
Hallo Sabine. May I say how much I appreciate what you do for me and so many others? You educate. You entertain. You enlighten. I’ve always had a passion for understanding the world we live in (and therefore not theoretical physics) and by listening to you my knowledge continues to grow and you make learning so much fun. Talking of which, I’m not fibbing when I saw that your humour just cracks me up. I’m always laughing out aloud when you make your humorous comments. They are so funny and natural. Next time you make a witty remark, be assured that I will be very much enjoying it when I view your episode. Thanks for all the work and creativity you put into your channel. You are the best! o.s. You are #1 on my list of interesting people I’d like at my next barbecue, but it’s always terrible weather when I plan said barbecue.
1 other piece of advice: check if there is a cooperative in your city that does the checking job for you and sells only food items and other goods they checked against a set of transparent criteria, like local provenance, fair trade, ethical values, non-excessive packaging, and sustainability. (Prices may be a bit higher, though.) There is such a cooperative in Warsaw where I live, and they deliver good quality in reasonable prices, offering price reductions for members. They even get out of the city on a regular basis to personally check out the conditions on the farms of the farmers they source their veggies with.
Yet another fantastic video, Sabine. More and more, I find myself looking forward to Saturday mornings, because I know I will be greeted by you and another exploration of a fascinating topic. Your content is consistently extraordinary, and I am consistently grateful to you for creating all of it. ❤
I remember a "labeling" news story from a while back. Some shirts were labelled as "made in germany" or similar - even tho they were clearly shipped from China. The manufacturer/seller twisted their way out of this because it was technically true. The label itself, on which "made in germany" was printed, was indeed a german product. The shirt it was sewn into was not 🤐
@@VelvetCondoms A way of showing how much of any given food or drink products ingredients were grown, processed and packed had to be created because of the issue of companies misrepresenting products as locally made and where the ingredients came from in Australia.
You know you have made a good video when Google slaps a context warning on the page. The way I treat green claims is I start from a position of 'They are all telling lies' and see if they can convince me that I am wrong
No. They put that warning on everything and anything containing anything to do with climate change whatsoever, not just videos supposedly speaking truth to power, or however you are viewing it.
This is healthy cynicism that seems to be well-informed by the reality that by default companies care more about strategies to sell us more stuff rather than strategies to reduce their impact on the environment.
Excellent discourse and training in analytical thinking, Sabine. Something that I have taught in my ethics courses at university. Love your videos! Vielen danke!!
No joke, the last jar of salt my wife brought home had a big, "Non-GMO" logo printed on the label. As if that wasn't enough, it also had an """expiration date""" prominently displayed on the back. 🤦♂️ In all my years, I never knew salt was an agricultural product, and apparently only retains preservative properties for 8 months after harvest. 😂
@@CAThompson Well, probably not what you think. In Germany, unleaded petrol and alcohol-free beer came at about the same time. At least one comedian didn't miss the opportunity to convolute that. The term stuck.
My favorite is "recyclable". It's great because it allows the company to shift the burden (i.e. to do nothing), while still making the product look kinda good. Most of those product are not really recyclable -- nobody recycles them.
Great video! Sabine is a G. I would add _repairability_ as a virtue. I don’t claim to know absolutely every single implication but it would be nice if people could keep their electronics around for longer.
Absolutely! It's so dumb that companies like John Deere and Apple have used proprietary software to make it impossible to repair the physical products we bought and own!
Totally agree. I hated so much to buy a new motor block for a food processor just because of a failed tiny plastic coupling sleeve, that I got around to make a drawing and 3d print one for myself.
Back in the old days (analog, mechanical) many of us could either fix things ourselves or find a repair shop to do it. Good luck trying to repair anything with a chip in it.
they wont get nobelprice for that but only for a real theory of making superconductors of differnt matrials if they have one - I just saw on video on "they get nobleprice" for lk-99
Thank you very much for this. A couple of things I'd add: Always consider that the least waste possible is much better. For example, bar shampoos & conditioners and sheet laundry soaps (both of which I use). And @ 13:51 I use Ecosia rather than Google for ANY searches.
It looks like Planet Wild does specific remediation projects with a start and finish (bottom up) rather than building an endless pyramid of "green" bureaucrats (top down). Very interesting approach!
My advise for Green-washing is always buy lower down the production ladder. Don't buy canned carrots, buy carrots. There are a series of interwoven issues: buy down the ladder means you have to do more work. This is considered menial, or women's, work so we are taught not to do it and it makes more economic sense to do the most specialized profitable work possible and let someone who is menial do the chopping of carrots. Instead of a person you often have large machines in factories chopping the carrots. The carbon footprint of the can of carrots is much larger than yours. Chopping carrots really isn't that much fun, but you can learn to do it well. It takes some thinking. But, once you learn and get a few tools you can make a carrot, parsnip and fennel slaw which is really very nice. Another way to avoid green washing is to avoid "True Believers" who often lack perspective. Plastic shipping bags were cheap, effective and per bag had a lower carbon footprint than any paper bag - any they were reusable. They are resealable because they are next to indestructible, no now they are everywhere hanging off every third tree. So now they are bad and paper bags are good again. Just because someone has the best of intentions doesn't mean they are right. IMHO the same is for electric cars. Tesla is getting dinged for wildly overstating their range. The lifespan of a L-Ion battery seems to be a lot less than advertised - gee would a car company lie?. So are they bad? NO. What we have to realize is that we don't need a general purpose engine. We can pick the right drive train for the job. What works well for me in NYC may not be a good choice for someone in Texas where the corner store is an hour away, on the corner. Here in NYC Hybrids are the rule for Taxi's and car services. They like Plug Ins, but since the cars are run almost 24-7-365 you don't have a lot of charge time, but a little helps. They use a lot less gas and you can smell the difference walking past them. You walk up Broadway, which is as choked with traffic as it says, and you walk past a bunch of Hybirds and the exhaust fumes are just not there. They are quiet. Delivery trucks. Same thing. Pickups in Montana? Maybe not. European readers should remember the the USA's population density is *Lower* than the Faroe Islands. So if you're in Europe you have to remember NYC is that biggest City in New York State. The second biggest is Buffalo wihich is about 400 miles driving distance, about the same as London to Glasgow, or a bit less than Paris to Marseilles. That's not leaving New York State. True Believers are looking for the perfect answer, we really need logs of good answers we can use right now.
Thanks for all the info, Sabine! 😊 At home, as I've been cooking, we've been eating lots of fresh vegetables. And my mother does composting as well. And we collect recyclables as well, they collect every Wednesday here. But, honestly, I don't think it's going to be enough. We need new and better technology. Fast. Anyway, stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊
I eventually got to 0% meat, but I can't attest to how I got there. Probably some combination of avoidance and climate concerns for future generations. Or maybe just because as I got older, I gave up everything I used to enjoy. I don't miss any of it. Note to self: re-read Siddhartha .
About how most people don't actually buy eco-friendly products, I think a lot of that has to do with cost. From what I see in stores in America, where I'm from, these products tend to be considerably more expensive and, if applicable, will contain less than the eco-unfriendly alternatives. I educate myself in climate science, I try to encourage others to look into it and inform those who are interested in listening to me, but I physically can't afford to commit to a completely climate-friendly lifestyle. I just have to wonder how much of a factor this is for people, as I know I'm not the only one. I've also noticed it has made some of my peers feel hopeless, or even resent popular climate-activists because "they *do* have the money to make change but are preaching to those who are struggling paycheck to paycheck". I can relate to the feeling of hopelessness and I can totally understand the perspective of seeing these people as know-it-all celebrities, especially since some of them *are*.
Great video. I read all nutritional labels before buying. Next, I determine the Car/Fiber ratio. If Carbs/Fiber is greater than 5, I put it back on the shelf. I avoid products with a lot of ingredients and with higher amounts of added sugar. For example I usually avoid products with > 5 grams of added sugar, usually 1-4 grams of added sugar is enough. The German products at Aldi stores here in the states have too much added sugar, so I avoid them. However, the Lindt & Sprungli chocolate has 1-4 grams added sugar, which is more to my liking. My motto is: Health Care is Self Care. You are your best doctor. Avoid highly processed foods and go for whole foods like nuts, fermented cabbage, kale, beet root, quinoa, beans, sardines, wild caught Alaskan salmon(no farm raised salmon).
The first thing I'll note is if it says per-serving or per-100g. It depends if you'll decide to gobble up a whole muesli pack for breffast, or a single serving.
It actually doesnt warn us against corporations, it more says corporations are really honest but they might get things wrong because, hey, it's all so complicated and the poor things are just getting confused and ultimately it is you the consumers who are to blame. I have some sympathy for the latter point but the first point is risible.
@@arctic_haze but the video isn't worth it because she isn't warning us against corporations but asking us for our sympathy at how difficult it is for corporations! Which by the way is bullshit, corporations know exactly what they are doing and are far from confused!
@@absstevens7464 She didn't ask for sympathy, simply described how corporations work. She also described one of the end results of that, the misleading green labels. You can hate corporations, but that doesn't change a thing, so I see no point in that. Some corporations may be misleading intentionally, others may be confused and just going on the beaten path, but it doesn't really matter when it comes to the outcome. To change them, you can vote with your wallet, or lobby for regulations, and that's about it.
Great that you've added examples of companies that actually walked the walk. Maybe we need to start a hall of fame for these companies. They get free PR and people will know that they're actually putting in the work.
I dont generally "leave a comment in the section below" (ok, so this is my 1st and perhaps only time), but I wanted to THANK YOU(!) for what you do. Your humorous approach and brilliant content/ commentary is awesome. Blessed be.
I've been avoiding products with "Natural" and "Healthy" all my life. It's both presumptuous and technically means absolutely nothing in a legal court. Words like that should just be illegal on products.
@@Apeiron242 Due to her observations of the effects those politicians, parties and policies. Much of what she covers is directly affected by political decisions.
Its quite relieving knowing that someone like Sabine is addressing such topics as manipulation and deception. That sht is out of control, humanity needs prominent objective minds to put a spotlight on all of it.
#7 Don't sweat the small stuff, is probably one of the biggest. Germany switching from nuclear to coal and natural gas is a bigger deal than, say, domestic flights. It's easy to focus on small symbolic stuff, because they impact our lives less.
...especially when the closing of nuclear plants and the inevitable transition to coal was spearheaded by the Green Party. Pretending to care about the environment in their quest for power, and to dupe feeble-minded voters is the biggest greenwashing of all, with the most dire consequences.
Germany isn't "moving to coal". Electricity generated by coal power plants is much less this year than last year. This nuclear stuff was just useless and expensive. Wind turbines had to be stopped to allow nuclear plants to feed their electricity into the grid. Since nuclear is gone, these wind turbines can do what they were built for.
Domestic flights is not 'the small stuff'. Turning off nuclear power stations early may well be worse (in Germany), but that doesn't make flights a minor thing you can ignore, especially as (in much of Europe) there are dramatically lower-carbon alternatives (the train). Let's say that the nuclear switch-off made German electricity 20% worse over the whole year on average (I suspect it's less that actually). That would mean an average European (3000kWh/yr) generated an extra 180KgCO2 over the year (direct consumption). One return flight Berlin/Stuttgart generates about twice as much as that (CO2e). So anyone taking more than one domestic flight in a year or even just one longer domestic flight is generating more CO2e with the flight. See - it's a very bad example of 'the small stuff'. A better one would be your margarine brand.
It's not that easy bein' green Having to spend each day The color of the leaves When I think it could be nicer Bein' red or yellow or gold Or something much more colorful like that It's not easy bein' green It seems you blend in With so many other ordinary things And people tend to pass you over Cause you're not standing out Like flashy sparkles in the water Or stars in the sky [Bridge] But green's the color of spring And green can be cool and friendlylike And green can be big like an ocean Or important like a mountain Or tall like a tree
I tend to discount most corporate green claims as there is generally solid business case for many 'green' projects - saving money. There are 2 ways to increase profits: increase sales and decrease costs. Decreasing costs often means being more efficient in for energy consumption, raw material use, etc which often is a net positive for the environment.
Great video again! I'd like to add to be aware of '100% biologic/ecologic' labels. In contrary to popular belief, these products are usually *less* climate friendly.
it drives me crazy when corporations or ppl try to greenwash meat and dairy. Livestock is impossible to make green, and that grass fed bs is even more harmful than FACTORY FARMS. this should be obvious given that factory farms are made for efficiency and minimum expenses, which results in less land and food used per kg of meat.
Things like grass-fed beef or ecological beef are actually bad for the enviroment, it reduces efficiency compared to industrial animal farming. Also, palm oil is very climate friendly.
it drives me crazy when corporations or ppl try to greenwash meat and dairy. Livestock is impossible to make green, and that grass fed bs is even more harmful than FACTORY FARMS. this should be obvious given that factory farms are made for efficiency and minimum expenses, which results in less land and food used per kg of meat.
Most all the ads on RUclips are companies that want to install solar panels on your house for free - problem is they hook you - asking you to sign over your home as collateral, to pay for it.
As another American, I'll even go so far as to say the word is still in common use here. Not as common as "lying", certainly, but it doesn't sound out of place when you hear it (or is that just me?)
"Fibbing" was commonly used in some parts of the US a few decades ago. That verb form in particular was used more than others. You didn't hear "fib" often, but would hear things like "He's fibbing," "Are you fibbing?" etc.
Blame the consumers that can barely keep affording to live, the companies that profit billions have to lie to us. Hire a sociologist to help with those reflections Sabine, this is a social phenomenal, not a scientific one and it shows you didn't have the best script. Love your work!
End consumers in no nation are responsible for more than 25% of national fossil emissions. The rest? Business, Institutions, Governments: BIG emitters. Why draw attention to 25% of the issue and fail to mention the 75% end? And in 25 nations, the world's largest fossil producers responsible for over 99.7% of emissions, that ratio of end consumer emission to total emissions is closer to 1:20. Looking at you USA, Russia, China, India, Canada, Germany..
California Insider did a great green washing interview. Including buying solar CCs, then using coal fired sources for peak usage in AM and PM periods. Most of the solar power is unused. Bundle the solar CCs with the coal power and you have a winner.
I... don't really worry about this. The main reason I don't is that electricity production and transportation account for about half of all carbon emissions. Me getting a product that produces 50% less carbon is meaningless. You mentioned not sweating the small stuff, and that's exactly what all this is focused on. If companies go carbon neutral, then my spending habits won't need to change because the companies will change it, and my buying actually green products won't have enough of an impact, it's the lobbies and people running the companies that do so. Plus, honestly, I'm poor. Not homeless, obviously, but I don't have extra money to spend on the more expensive eco-friendly products. Or extra money to spend on much of anything. I routinely have to ask my family for financial help just to get _bad_ groceries.
My thoughts? My first effort to be enviramental friendly was: "Stop buying stuff that will shortly end up in the basement or attic." Green labeled or not, buying less things, in my opinion is the best way to reduce your carbon footprint. It helped me to work less days/hours and doing more stuff I really like, now finding out I earned at least twice the amount of money I actualy needed for living. ☺ To my advantage, I like biking a lot. The gained spare hours I spent on my bike helped me to get physically in better shape. In manager-talk: A win-win situation! (Disclaimer) If the better physics make me live twice as long as I would before, the "carbon footprint gain" could be reduced dramatically. 🤔
Hallo Sabine! Ich hätte eine Frage und wollte ein paar Dinge loswerden. Ersteinmal finde ich es großartig, wie sie über Physik aufklären - ich bin auf dem Gebiet nicht weiter gekommen als mir im Gymnasium beigebracht wurde, aber Sie haben mir gezeigt, dass dieser "mystische" Ort eigentlich gar keiner ist. Ihre objektive Art und Weise ist absolut einzigartig und wenn ich mehr Ahnung auf dem Gebiet hätte, würde ich es genauso machen wie sie. Bevor ich hier alles vergesse. Es ist eine simple Frage: Was halten sie von dem Newsportal Scinexx? Ist es seriös oder wird dort eher auf "Schlagzeilenmachen" geachtet? Ich wünsche ihnen einen schönen Tag! MfG Vralr
I am sick of all the commercials nowadays: marketing nowadays is not about the (proposed) qualities of the product itself but about the socio-political views of the company that makes them.
As a renewable energy engineer, I have to admit that, unfortunately, the same applies to renewable energy sources like wind and PV as well. They are not nearly as environment-friendly as the average person thinks.
The question to ask is: On what scale? Compared to what? Well, compared to fossil fuels: Production, refining, shipping, distributing, and finally burning of fossil fuels - a one time use, to be repeated in necessarily inefficient (~20!%) engines. Wind and solar clearly aren't all 'clean' but for one there is room for improvement, and for another their environmental 'debit' is amortized over fucking decades, not minutes as in combustion.
@@mv80401 I can answer your questions in some amount of detail afterwards but before I do so, I would just like to say I don't think you realize that ramping up the generation 'capacity' of renewable energy sources necessitates increased consumption of fossil fuels to fill in for their rather long periods of inactivity. Their intermittent nature makes them highly unreliable as stable sources of energy. I can't even count the number of times I have had to wait for months (not days or weeks but months!) to commission a windfarm controller simply because there wasn't enough wind. Germany (where I currently) live is a perfect example (a cautionary tale, in fact) of such a policy. Just want to mention that I haven't even enumerated the practical environmental downsides of an increased reliance on renewable energy souces like PV and wind for energy generation.
@@usmanshahid8069 PV and CST offsets the time when the wind does not blow, and so does the wind simply blowing ESLEWHERE. Obviously that works the other way, too, with wind offsetting the time there is low irradiance. Then there's battery systems for storing energy while it's being generated and dispersing it during dunkelflaute. There's also the fact that not everywhere is like Germany - I live in Western Australia and probably PV alone, with some battery storage here and there, could meet all our needs. Lastly, there are other sources to firm renewables that aren't fossil fuel driven, like pumped hydro and nuclear. If you are really what you say you are, you should know all of this...
@@PinataOblongata God, there are so many flaws in your argument that it would take pages to respond to all of them. :) First, I don't need to explain my credentials to anyone. Suffice it to say, I am well-qualified to answer all your points in detail - I have an MSc. in power engineering from one of Germany's top technical universities and have worked at a 300 kW coal test rig as an intern (along with my 8+ years experience in the renewable energy field) but due to space and time constraints, I'll keep my response short. Your basic assumption is that power being generated elsewhere will be able to compensate for the inactivity of renewable energy sources. You cite PV as an example but it's equally as intermittent as wind. In a lot of places, the low wind season coincides with winter. How are you going to expect PV to compensate for low wind output? No battery system is capable of large amounts of energy storage for long periods of time. And our batteries (as well as PV cells) at the moment are composed of substances that are either toxic or difficult to mine or difficult to dispose off (in an environtment-friendly manner) or a combination of all three. Batteries have a finite lifespan and their performance progressively deteriorates over time even before they have reached the end of their life. Perhaps you would be comfortable sending them off to underdeveloped countries for disposal since then it wouldn't be your problem anymore. That would still not be good for the planet as a whole. I don't blame you because to an average layman, a mixture of different renewable sources seems like a perfectly good solution - until and unless you actually have some real-world experience with them.
Cute that Sabine had to look up "fib". Reminds me of the time I tried to order a meatless breakfast in Bielefeld-- it does exist BTW-- and I swear I was using the right words from my German-English dictionary. Finally, I relented and said "Big Breakfast" and the whole joint sprang into action to get me one of those. Then I gave back the meat portion. Or maybe I ate the whole thing as a non-committed vegetarian at the time. The aroma was probably very enticing. In fact, I'm still remembering it. Where was I? Oh yeah, don't eat meat, it's not eco friendly.
I realised that yeah, it's bad to have companies import and sell goods more cheaply from overseas/interstate/internationally than just sell more local products but I'm buying the bags of frozen fruit and vegetables and the packaged snacks that have the best value for me, rather than buying more fresh, unprocessed fruit and veg, that'll go off in my fridge because I really don't want to spend extra time preparing and cooking it. As for cleaning products I try to go for a mix of economy and genuine environmental benefits. It irks me how many big corporations have more eco-friendly options available but the company still sells their normal products but I still buy them because hey, cheap/on special. I think in my case I should also focus on attributes like overall lifespan of things like phones and clothing that do cause more drastic issues from demand and disposal.
What would be most efficient is if the local vegetables & co. would be processed into food by someone who cooks for dozens ore even hundreds of people in a local soup kitchen, so that you could benefit from an economy of scale in cooking like with industrially produced food while still not needing to transport the food a long way.
@@jannikheidemann3805 Then issues of time available to get this soup, having means to transport myself and a supply of soup and of storing it come into play. It's something that I would parasite partake of at least sometimes though.
it drives me crazy when corporations or ppl try to greenwash meat and dairy. Livestock is impossible to make green, and that grass fed bs is even more harmful than FACTORY FARMS. this should be obvious given that factory farms are made for efficiency and minimum expenses, which results in less land and food used per kg of meat.
Apple does all they can to avoid repairing a product being easy or affordable in order to sell a new one. They also started the trend of selling less accessories in the box so that you will buy other product like airpods or chargers
My old computer from the early 90s shows a "energy star" label (on the top right) when booting up. So these old machines are quite energy efficient it seems :D
It's like products that say on label: No GMO or No Preservative on product that can't and never have ones like milk GMO free (GMO milk didn't ever exist).
A problem with net-zero is that it does not scale. We cannot all install solar panels to generate electricity during the day, and then use electricity generated from fossil fuels at night, and claim we've achieved net-zero. Displacing fossil fuelled generation during the day is better than nothing, but it's a really low hanging fruit.
How could anyone claim net-zero has been achieved in your example? Fossil fuels are still being burned. I don't think anyone is doing that. The problem of energy storage to achieve renewable energy at night etc is much talked about nowadays.
What does scale is if you during the night use wind power that is often available during the night and if it isn't, than you could burn gas produced using surplus renewable energy from the times and places that have an overproduction of energy. It's for example hard to run powerlines from the Sahara to Berlin to use the solar power there, but transporting methane liquefied using solar energy in a ship powered by wind and methane to be distributed in the german gas pipe network is more feasible.
Imagine thinking Apple is even slightly eco friendly when they're one of the most egregious cases of producing e-waste by locking everything out of everything else whenever they feel like they can sell more shit that way, which is generally always.
Greenwashing is everywhere 😡 But the effects of it are devastating 🌎🌍🌏💔 And we as consumers are in very large parts lazy, dishonest and not willing to change our investments and habits ourselves too. So we are not better than the companies believe me! Thank You for covering!
If Carbon Dioxide emissions were actually the driving force for climate change, it would make a difference... but they don't. One can look at carbon dioxide levels and glacial ice ages to see the proof that carbon dioxide levels are not the driving force for climate change. I am all for reducing pollution emissions, but carbon dioxide is not one of them. If carbon dioxide was the cause of so much heat, then explain the ice ages when there was much more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. We should focus on real issues that matter such as making the recycle label actually mean that the product can be easily recycled. Making sure garbage collection companies actually perform the recycling of the trash in a much better way, and not offload the duty of sorting trash to the human, but rather the garbage company itself.
I saw in my store toilet paper labeled as being a "100% recycled" product. I mean, I try to do my part, but I draw the line at using recycled toilet paper.
Wonderful video Sabine, and took your advice about your sponsor too. You didn't mention packaging (which may be a video in its own right), but if I'm searching for a product in the supermarket I first stand back to see if any have environmentally-friendly packaging (glass, can, cardboard, or none) and buy plastic only as a last resort.
@SabineHossenfelder_ thank you but I think jannekheidemann3805 pointed out the biggest hypocrisy of "going Green" companies with their unrepairable planned obsolescence
What a teacher Sabine is! I really wish I could, someday, talk to her about Maxwell equations, Fourier Series and Laplace transform 😊 (yes, I am autistic)
@7:28 Saying it's even partly because it's 'difficult' to get it right is a bit of a dodge. What it is is difficult to get it right _and not lose profits._ Not including that in your statement makes you a suspected shill for those companies.
Another good example is "ocean plastic". It became popular with the discovery of the North Pacific garbage patch => "plastic island"; plastics are being recovered from our oceans but consumer good makers are riding on that wave: sneakers are being advertised as "made from/with ocean plastic". Checking the fine print reveals that a) the material used is not "ocean plastic but "ocean bound/river plastic" and b) only 10% of the material of the sneakers are linked to that
Take this short quiz to see how much you remember from this video: quizwithit.com/start_thequiz/1694038558467x520962300978453200
hi
Also, always remember that the greenest choice is almost always not to buy. Reducing and then reusing what you already have are far greener than buying a new "green" option. If you do need to buy, getting something used is greener than buying new. In all these cases, the vast majority of emissions and other pollution have already happened.
First question one should ask before any purchase anyway: Do i actually need this? You're not saving anything by buying something needlessly.
The "don't buy" choice is great. When I do buy, my lazy choice is to avoid anything liquid. Water is heavy and it takes a lot of energy to get those products to market. I buy dry and use boiled tap water when I can. Okay, that's a lie. I cheat sometimes, but mostly. My water philosophy is in denial about fruits and vegetables.
So true, and so far removed from how the consumer machine pushes us.
Well the greenest choice is to die, just sayin.
@@destructionman1 sure, but do you actually have something useful to say?
Sabine's ability to inform and clarify humiliates mainstream media organizations. How does she do that? I answer: first she thinks carefully, then she speaks her thoughts. So much needed today and always. Thanks, Sabine 👏👏👏
I think she's right in line with mainstream media. Talking about trans ppl. Saying fossil fuels are causing all our problems. Never giving an opposing view. In which there are many. I want both sides. Sabine is entertaining enough to watch. So I do.
@@andrewruiz7894"Both" sides? What both? Why are there only two sides? I can think of many different value systems. Not just two.
And does "side" only include different values so that we come to different rational conclusions based on facts or do you want a "side" that articulates something different to a factual and rational consideration, too?
MERCI 👏🏿👍🏿💚🌴☀️
Sabine doesn't scream. I mean this literally and figuratively. She just speaks calmly and without emotional outbursts. It reminds me someone explaining rules of board game.
@@andrewruiz7894do you also want “both” sides’ opinion on earth’s shape maybe?
Or maybe “both” sides’ opinion on some little mustache guy’s actions in 1930s Germany?
Apple may look good on that chart, but what that chart does not take into account is repair. Repairing most things, especially electronics, is always much more environmentally friendly than making a new one, even if the new one hypothetically was made from 100% recycled materials. Repair often uses just a tiny fraction of the materials and energy needed to manufacture a replacement of the entire device.
Apple makes the repair of thier products unnecessarily hard by restricting replacement parts, schematics and software that are needed for repairs.
Apples anti repair lobbying efforts damage repairability of many products beyond the Apple ecosystem.
Perhaps, even more important than the issue of repairs is the well established practice in the tech industry of the "programmed obsolescence" of their products.
The EU is forcing them to be better about this though it seems which is good.
same is true for cars, it's way better to drive a car for another 5 years than to buy a gimmicky hybrid
My 20 year old original PowerBook still works. My 17 year old iMac still works. So go ahead and complain about repairs, but also consider life-time of products.
@@TheDanEdwards That just means that Apple made durable stuff 17 years ago, not that they still do. A LOT can change in a company in that time.
I explained my friends so many times, that organic and eco labels mean nothing(or very little). Nobody listens. I'm biotechnology engineer, I know biology and chemistry but noooo, yoga instructor knows better.
Yoga-instructor tells them what they want to hear; you (try to) tell them what they don't want to hear.
Wizard's first rule (Terry Goodkind): People will believe a lie, either because they want it to be true or they fear it to be true.
This falls in the first category.
Now, do we have to become just as good at lying as the greenwashers or do we need to put the fear of science into the gullables.....
And how do we do that last bit?
went to a business class with an orchard grower, she told us that eco and organic in her field meant that she just couldn't use around half of the *icides available.
In our particular case (Poland) it's much more religion classes at school than any other single science classes. And also a way of teaching, government interventions in education and so on. It is a very sad situation.
@DreadX you said it nicely. We have to do the same what US did in 60ties - make science and education trendy. But that's a role of a wise government. To bet on development. A very difficult thing to do.
Yet there is a hope still, because of people like Sabine and many other science educators. Let's hope that big business model of RUclips will not force them out of this platform.
In the EU at least, we have well enforced regulation about the criteria that organic labeled food/agriculture has to fulfill. And as far as I know EU-organic agriculture is significantly better for biodiversity and sustaining healty soil. Still not perfect, as some problematic stuff is not banned, but much better than conventional.
The only critics I have heard about organic, is that it is not healthier and not better for the climate, but that's not what the organic label is for.
@@h-z1218 honestly my problem with whole eco/organic is price and quality. The nutritional value is most of the same(examples: eggs, root vegetables like carrot or callery), taste is just an opinion. Then eco/organic stuff is 50% more pricy or even more.
Sabine, THANK YOU for also guiding to a better approach!
So many people just stop at the "pointless button", which is the worst consequence of greenwashing.
Sabine Hossenfelder is wonderful. There are additional, easy tips to remember if you want to contribute to an improved environment. Here are a few:
✦ Buy a better quality product that will last. Too many cheap things end up in the trash.
✦ Buy LED lighting fixtures; they require much less electricity to operate and are supposed to last a long time.
✦ Maintain optimal comfort at home in the space you use, not necessarily the entire house. A small ceramic heater, for example, is both efficient and safe.
✦ Learn about local recycling, and participate in the program. Learn which things they want and what will contaminate the recycling stream.
✦ Avoid packaging that isn't accepted for recycling. Around here for example, the local recycling operation has no buyers for styrene products, or for plastics without a recycling code number.
Most recycling streams flow into landfills. Glass is easy to recycle, but not cost effective. Most plastic can not be recycled and eventually ends up in the ocean.
My favorite one is "No chemical additives"....meaning that they don't put any pure substances in
Also, *EVERYTHING is chemicals*. 🙃
"So it's a bottle of vacuum?"
I wonder if anybody is selling 100% organic tablesalt. And what exactly it is they are actually selling.
I also love when they put "vegan" labels on things that are naturally entirely made without animal parts. Like olive oil.
Trans fats free bottled water....
I don't put any chemicals in the software I develop. Should I add an irrelevant label about that?
Oh man, I remember a few years ago seeing a screenshot of the comments section of a fb group promoting some kind of “natural” product and a clever young lady asked “does it contain _dihydrogen monoxide_ ?” To which the response was something to effect of: “No, absolutely NO chemicals.” I don’t know if that actually happened but still pretty good haha
I saw a "green" box of paperclips. It looked like plain carboard with black and green printing instead of the traditional red on white for office supplies in the US. When I opened it I saw that the inside was glossy white. By all appearances they'd just turned their boxes over, printed on the back, and assembled them inside out!
Apple as an example:
They may present themselves as nice, but as long as the company prevents its products from being repaired, it is a good example to divert attention from the actual topic.
Every defective device is replaced by a new one, which is a disaster considering the abundance of resources that are necessary for a smartphone and cannot be recycled.
If an IPhone could be repaired instead, Apple would only need to produce two thirds of the IPhones, with the corresponding positive effects on the eco-balance, but nobody talks about that!
But instead Apple builds a few wind turbines and does next level greenwashing .
The next example at Apple would be the thing with the USBs.
If they really took environmental protection seriously, they wouldn't have fought the EU regulation so hard.
I don't want to claim that Apple's competitors are better. What always distinguishes Apple from the competition is that they present themselves better than they are in all aspects!
Apple is also a trendsetter for many anti repair "innovations" or for removing headphone jacks for example, requiring wireless headphones with hard to replace batteries of themselves.
An iPhone 4 with an wired headphones used one battery.
An iPhone 12 with AirPods uses three additional batteries, two for the ear pieces and one for the charging case and AirPod batteries are even harder to replace than that of the iPhone itself.
And now other manufacturers are doing the same, causing further harm to the environment!
All true, repairability and fewer required batteries are important issues, but I‘d like to add that in my experience Apple products last very long. As the performance of consumer electronics has plateaued somewhat, Apple‘s long-term software support makes it possible to use the iPhones and iPads for five to six years, no problem. Computers even longer. In my family I see a quicker turnaround rate with Android devices.
Of course you have to take care of your device (what the hell do people do to lightning cables?!) and yes, you can of course change an iPhone-battery at an Apple store - it‘s expensive, but still cheaper than buying a new phone of similar performance.
They are also responsible for stalling inovation for profits and selling gimicks as features.
@@JonoConstantini Interesting, what kind of software issues is your family experiencing that make it necessary to replace the physical device?
In theory, software, being digital, should not degrade like hardware does due to wear, if you don't change it.
Updates that bloat the software and make a phone slower have been an issue, but that is an issue not unheard of with Apple.
@@JonoConstantini For older Android devices, there are third party operating systems solving the problem of lacking manufacturer updates. There's CalyxOS and LineageOS which offer up-to-date Android versions for older phones. It's genuine Android, so user experience is about the same.
If you also care about your privacy, there are iodéOS and DivestOS. These are also based on Android, but parts sending your data to Google servers are removed. Which means, a few things stop working and need a different app. Which is the better choice depends on how much you value your privacy.
The hardest part: making people recognize that one needs no new device just to get a new operating system. For many, hardware and OS are "the same".
no animals were harmed during the making of this film.
I'm pretty sure Sabine killed some singe celled animals or maybe even killed multicellular members of the animalis kingdom.
That carton of eggs would beg to differ
@@pizzaiolo181 Not if those eggs weren't fertilised.
What's the fuss about animals? Plants are alive and are probably more important than animals.
@@aniksamiurrahman6365 Well, most plants won't be available for long or many generations without the animals who are pollinators. And even the dung of other animals support the microorganism in the soil which support the plants.
So, maybe the fuss about the animals could be that they are part of the circle of life and maybe none of the components of this circle is "more important" ... just a thought.
My favourite greenwashing claim was on a box of dog poo bags I bought on the internet last year, which was boldly branded as "Reusable".
Eww....
Well they could be I suppose 🤷♂️😂
You are the ONLY one who questions EVERYTHING about current affairs that's on my mind! I'm so glad for your work! Thank you 😊. I don't think it's worth consuming main stream media anymore, they aren't talking about the obvious subjects but try to distract us from what is really going on.
You’re looking great Sabine and I love your videos. Especially the environmentally informative ones. Keep them coming please.
"Fibbing" is not an outdated term. It's been in common use for a very long time, like most words, but remains in common use.
Eh not too much still common enough but most people honestly don’t use it anymore
It's outdated where I'm from.
You don't see it on the internet a lot.
@@maleahlock I grew out of fibbing years ago, I'm now a liar, but children are still fibbers.
I think op was in fact fibbing about well… fibbing😆
Hallo Sabine. May I say how much I appreciate what you do for me and so many others? You educate. You entertain. You enlighten. I’ve always had a passion for understanding the world we live in (and therefore not theoretical physics) and by listening to you my knowledge continues to grow and you make learning so much fun. Talking of which, I’m not fibbing when I saw that your humour just cracks me up. I’m always laughing out aloud when you make your humorous comments. They are so funny and natural. Next time you make a witty remark, be assured that I will be very much enjoying it when I view your episode.
Thanks for all the work and creativity you put into your channel. You are the best!
o.s. You are #1 on my list of interesting people I’d like at my next barbecue, but it’s always terrible weather when I plan said barbecue.
You're the only person whose video sponsorship I would actually trust, and that's saying something. I'll be sure to check them out after the video.
1 other piece of advice: check if there is a cooperative in your city that does the checking job for you and sells only food items and other goods they checked against a set of transparent criteria, like local provenance, fair trade, ethical values, non-excessive packaging, and sustainability. (Prices may be a bit higher, though.) There is such a cooperative in Warsaw where I live, and they deliver good quality in reasonable prices, offering price reductions for members. They even get out of the city on a regular basis to personally check out the conditions on the farms of the farmers they source their veggies with.
Yet another fantastic video, Sabine. More and more, I find myself looking forward to Saturday mornings, because I know I will be greeted by you and another exploration of a fascinating topic. Your content is consistently extraordinary, and I am consistently grateful to you for creating all of it. ❤
I agree but 'fibbing' on the scale was really just up from 'white lies', green washing on the other hand is up there with 'lying b'stards'.
I remember a "labeling" news story from a while back. Some shirts were labelled as "made in germany" or similar - even tho they were clearly shipped from China. The manufacturer/seller twisted their way out of this because it was technically true. The label itself, on which "made in germany" was printed, was indeed a german product. The shirt it was sewn into was not 🤐
ha 😅
😕
well if Germany continues down the rabbit hole, "made in Germany" won't even be worth faking anymore.
That is a problem here in the US as well. Companies will fake manufacturing products here.
@@VelvetCondoms A way of showing how much of any given food or drink products ingredients were grown, processed and packed had to be created because of the issue of companies misrepresenting products as locally made and where the ingredients came from in Australia.
You know you have made a good video when Google slaps a context warning on the page.
The way I treat green claims is I start from a position of 'They are all telling lies' and see if they can convince me that I am wrong
No. They put that warning on everything and anything containing anything to do with climate change whatsoever, not just videos supposedly speaking truth to power, or however you are viewing it.
This is healthy cynicism that seems to be well-informed by the reality that by default companies care more about strategies to sell us more stuff rather than strategies to reduce their impact on the environment.
I'm not sure the content warning is an indicator of anything, other than machine reading detected certain keywords in the video
Excellent discourse and training in analytical thinking, Sabine. Something that I have taught in my ethics courses at university. Love your videos! Vielen danke!!
It's nice to see organizations like Planet Wild cropping up. I currently support a similar one called Mossy Earth.
Asbestos-free cornflakes is my favorite meme about the Sin of Irrelevance.
See also gluten and GMO-free water.
No joke, the last jar of salt my wife brought home had a big, "Non-GMO" logo printed on the label. As if that wasn't enough, it also had an """expiration date""" prominently displayed on the back. 🤦♂️ In all my years, I never knew salt was an agricultural product, and apparently only retains preservative properties for 8 months after harvest. 😂
Personally, I like lead-free beer.
@@Skyldyel I can vaguely imagine how lead could get in beer but I hope it's too far-fetched.
@@CAThompson Well, probably not what you think. In Germany, unleaded petrol and alcohol-free beer came at about the same time. At least one comedian didn't miss the opportunity to convolute that. The term stuck.
My favorite is "recyclable". It's great because it allows the company to shift the burden (i.e. to do nothing), while still making the product look kinda good. Most of those product are not really recyclable -- nobody recycles them.
Great video! Sabine is a G. I would add _repairability_ as a virtue. I don’t claim to know absolutely every single implication but it would be nice if people could keep their electronics around for longer.
Absolutely! It's so dumb that companies like John Deere and Apple have used proprietary software to make it impossible to repair the physical products we bought and own!
Totally agree. I hated so much to buy a new motor block for a food processor just because of a failed tiny plastic coupling sleeve, that I got around to make a drawing and 3d print one for myself.
Back in the old days (analog, mechanical) many of us could either fix things ourselves or find a repair shop to do it. Good luck trying to repair anything with a chip in it.
@@oleksiysokolov3510 nicely done!
I can't wait to hear Sabine talk about the LK-99 "super conductor".
Yes, will talk about it on Wednesday, working on it as we speak!
they wont get nobelprice for that but only for a real theory of making superconductors of differnt matrials if they have one - I just saw on video on "they get nobleprice" for lk-99
No resistance from me ⚡
nah, from what ive seen of it its not convincing and useless, no resistance at 70 mA up to 95C.
a whole whopping 70 milliAmps.
@@xerr0n ?
Thank you for yet another well researched and informative video! I joined Planet Wild and told them you sent me!
Thank you very much for this. A couple of things I'd add:
Always consider that the least waste possible is much better. For example, bar shampoos & conditioners and sheet laundry soaps (both of which I use).
And @ 13:51 I use Ecosia rather than Google for ANY searches.
It looks like Planet Wild does specific remediation projects with a start and finish (bottom up) rather than building an endless pyramid of "green" bureaucrats (top down). Very interesting approach!
My advise for Green-washing is always buy lower down the production ladder. Don't buy canned carrots, buy carrots. There are a series of interwoven issues: buy down the ladder means you have to do more work. This is considered menial, or women's, work so we are taught not to do it and it makes more economic sense to do the most specialized profitable work possible and let someone who is menial do the chopping of carrots. Instead of a person you often have large machines in factories chopping the carrots. The carbon footprint of the can of carrots is much larger than yours. Chopping carrots really isn't that much fun, but you can learn to do it well. It takes some thinking. But, once you learn and get a few tools you can make a carrot, parsnip and fennel slaw which is really very nice. Another way to avoid green washing is to avoid "True Believers" who often lack perspective. Plastic shipping bags were cheap, effective and per bag had a lower carbon footprint than any paper bag - any they were reusable. They are resealable because they are next to indestructible, no now they are everywhere hanging off every third tree. So now they are bad and paper bags are good again. Just because someone has the best of intentions doesn't mean they are right. IMHO the same is for electric cars. Tesla is getting dinged for wildly overstating their range. The lifespan of a L-Ion battery seems to be a lot less than advertised - gee would a car company lie?. So are they bad? NO. What we have to realize is that we don't need a general purpose engine. We can pick the right drive train for the job. What works well for me in NYC may not be a good choice for someone in Texas where the corner store is an hour away, on the corner. Here in NYC Hybrids are the rule for Taxi's and car services. They like Plug Ins, but since the cars are run almost 24-7-365 you don't have a lot of charge time, but a little helps. They use a lot less gas and you can smell the difference walking past them. You walk up Broadway, which is as choked with traffic as it says, and you walk past a bunch of Hybirds and the exhaust fumes are just not there. They are quiet. Delivery trucks. Same thing. Pickups in Montana? Maybe not. European readers should remember the the USA's population density is *Lower* than the Faroe Islands. So if you're in Europe you have to remember NYC is that biggest City in New York State. The second biggest is Buffalo wihich is about 400 miles driving distance, about the same as London to Glasgow, or a bit less than Paris to Marseilles. That's not leaving New York State. True Believers are looking for the perfect answer, we really need logs of good answers we can use right now.
Thanks for all the info, Sabine! 😊
At home, as I've been cooking, we've been eating lots of fresh vegetables. And my mother does composting as well. And we collect recyclables as well, they collect every Wednesday here.
But, honestly, I don't think it's going to be enough. We need new and better technology. Fast.
Anyway, stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊
I eventually got to 0% meat, but I can't attest to how I got there. Probably some combination of avoidance and climate concerns for future generations. Or maybe just because as I got older, I gave up everything I used to enjoy. I don't miss any of it. Note to self: re-read Siddhartha .
About how most people don't actually buy eco-friendly products, I think a lot of that has to do with cost. From what I see in stores in America, where I'm from, these products tend to be considerably more expensive and, if applicable, will contain less than the eco-unfriendly alternatives. I educate myself in climate science, I try to encourage others to look into it and inform those who are interested in listening to me, but I physically can't afford to commit to a completely climate-friendly lifestyle. I just have to wonder how much of a factor this is for people, as I know I'm not the only one. I've also noticed it has made some of my peers feel hopeless, or even resent popular climate-activists because "they *do* have the money to make change but are preaching to those who are struggling paycheck to paycheck". I can relate to the feeling of hopelessness and I can totally understand the perspective of seeing these people as know-it-all celebrities, especially since some of them *are*.
Great video. I read all nutritional labels before buying. Next, I determine the Car/Fiber ratio. If Carbs/Fiber is greater than 5, I put it back on the shelf. I avoid products with a lot of ingredients and with higher amounts of added sugar.
For example I usually avoid products with > 5 grams of added sugar, usually 1-4 grams of added sugar is enough.
The German products at Aldi stores here in the states have too much added sugar, so I avoid them. However, the Lindt & Sprungli chocolate has 1-4 grams added sugar, which is more to my liking. My motto is: Health Care is Self Care. You are your best doctor. Avoid highly processed foods and go for whole foods like nuts, fermented cabbage, kale, beet root, quinoa, beans, sardines, wild caught Alaskan salmon(no farm raised salmon).
The first thing I'll note is if it says per-serving or per-100g. It depends if you'll decide to gobble up a whole muesli pack for breffast, or a single serving.
@@randreas69 most most of the time it's per serving.
This video is actually environmentally friendly in the sense that it warns us against corporations trying to sell us things under false green guise.
It actually doesnt warn us against corporations, it more says corporations are really honest but they might get things wrong because, hey, it's all so complicated and the poor things are just getting confused and ultimately it is you the consumers who are to blame. I have some sympathy for the latter point but the first point is risible.
@saelesbonsazse9919 Nonzero but my point is that it is still worth it.
@@saelesbonsazse9919not even close to the amount of hot air that Thunberg woman generates.
@@arctic_haze but the video isn't worth it because she isn't warning us against corporations but asking us for our sympathy at how difficult it is for corporations! Which by the way is bullshit, corporations know exactly what they are doing and are far from confused!
@@absstevens7464 She didn't ask for sympathy, simply described how corporations work. She also described one of the end results of that, the misleading green labels. You can hate corporations, but that doesn't change a thing, so I see no point in that. Some corporations may be misleading intentionally, others may be confused and just going on the beaten path, but it doesn't really matter when it comes to the outcome. To change them, you can vote with your wallet, or lobby for regulations, and that's about it.
Sabine, you are such a breath of fresh air. Live long and prosper!
Great that you've added examples of companies that actually walked the walk. Maybe we need to start a hall of fame for these companies.
They get free PR and people will know that they're actually putting in the work.
I dont generally "leave a comment in the section below" (ok, so this is my 1st and perhaps only time), but I wanted to THANK YOU(!) for what you do. Your humorous approach and brilliant content/ commentary is awesome. Blessed be.
Great video as always. Ty for the info on Planet Wild. Sounds like an ideal organization to contribute to.
I was so confused by this video at first, but thankfully RUclips added some context from the UN. Phew! Now it all makes sense.
That's a good one! Thank you, Sabine & Team!
I've been avoiding products with "Natural" and "Healthy" all my life.
It's both presumptuous and technically means absolutely nothing in a legal court. Words like that should just be illegal on products.
I’ve always tried to think for myself the best I can. But, if I were to give up thinking for myself, I might let Sabine think for me.
How is that a problem? 😸
that you said nicely 👍
Careful. She's not as objective you might think. Many of her videos have a strong political slant.
@@Apeiron242 in genuinely curious: into which direction?
@@Apeiron242 Due to her observations of the effects those politicians, parties and policies. Much of what she covers is directly affected by political decisions.
Its quite relieving knowing that someone like Sabine is addressing such topics as manipulation and deception. That sht is out of control, humanity needs prominent objective minds to put a spotlight on all of it.
You're watching one such person. They're outnumbered though, sadly.
#7 Don't sweat the small stuff, is probably one of the biggest. Germany switching from nuclear to coal and natural gas is a bigger deal than, say, domestic flights. It's easy to focus on small symbolic stuff, because they impact our lives less.
...especially when the closing of nuclear plants and the inevitable transition to coal was spearheaded by the Green Party. Pretending to care about the environment in their quest for power, and to dupe feeble-minded voters is the biggest greenwashing of all, with the most dire consequences.
Germany isn't "moving to coal". Electricity generated by coal power plants is much less this year than last year.
This nuclear stuff was just useless and expensive. Wind turbines had to be stopped to allow nuclear plants to feed their electricity into the grid. Since nuclear is gone, these wind turbines can do what they were built for.
Domestic flights is not 'the small stuff'. Turning off nuclear power stations early may well be worse (in Germany), but that doesn't make flights a minor thing you can ignore, especially as (in much of Europe) there are dramatically lower-carbon alternatives (the train). Let's say that the nuclear switch-off made German electricity 20% worse over the whole year on average (I suspect it's less that actually). That would mean an average European (3000kWh/yr) generated an extra 180KgCO2 over the year (direct consumption). One return flight Berlin/Stuttgart generates about twice as much as that (CO2e). So anyone taking more than one domestic flight in a year or even just one longer domestic flight is generating more CO2e with the flight.
See - it's a very bad example of 'the small stuff'. A better one would be your margarine brand.
I always try to avoid products with excessive plastic pakaging regardless of labels
I love Sabine's vids, I learn so much and she nearly has a British sense of humour. And that's not a fib.
I came here not expecting to see an asdfmovie clip. But Sabine's sense of humor is even better than I already thought
It's not that easy bein' green
Having to spend each day
The color of the leaves
When I think it could be nicer
Bein' red or yellow or gold
Or something much more colorful like that
It's not easy bein' green
It seems you blend in
With so many other ordinary things
And people tend to pass you over
Cause you're not standing out
Like flashy sparkles in the water
Or stars in the sky
[Bridge]
But green's the color of spring
And green can be cool and friendlylike
And green can be big like an ocean
Or important like a mountain
Or tall like a tree
I tend to discount most corporate green claims as there is generally solid business case for many 'green' projects - saving money. There are 2 ways to increase profits: increase sales and decrease costs. Decreasing costs often means being more efficient in for energy consumption, raw material use, etc which often is a net positive for the environment.
Great video again!
I'd like to add to be aware of '100% biologic/ecologic' labels. In contrary to popular belief, these products are usually *less* climate friendly.
it drives me crazy when corporations or ppl try to greenwash meat and dairy.
Livestock is impossible to make green, and that grass fed bs is even more harmful than FACTORY FARMS.
this should be obvious given that factory farms are made for efficiency and minimum expenses, which results in less land and food used per kg of meat.
Things like grass-fed beef or ecological beef are actually bad for the enviroment, it reduces efficiency compared to industrial animal farming.
Also, palm oil is very climate friendly.
it drives me crazy when corporations or ppl try to greenwash meat and dairy.
Livestock is impossible to make green, and that grass fed bs is even more harmful than FACTORY FARMS.
this should be obvious given that factory farms are made for efficiency and minimum expenses, which results in less land and food used per kg of meat.
Love the bottom up approach. I think the best example I saw of this was a video (search youtube) called 'How wolves changed the course of a river.'
This is a great overview of the topic! Thank you:)
Most all the ads on RUclips are companies that want to install solar panels on your house for free - problem is they hook you - asking you to sign over your home as collateral, to pay for it.
as an old American dude: Your reaction to the word "fibbing" made my day! I have always loved that word and threw it at my kids quits often. 😎
As another American, I'll even go so far as to say the word is still in common use here. Not as common as "lying", certainly, but it doesn't sound out of place when you hear it (or is that just me?)
@@charliehubbard4073 Ditto in Australia.
"Fibbing" was commonly used in some parts of the US a few decades ago. That verb form in particular was used more than others. You didn't hear "fib" often, but would hear things like "He's fibbing," "Are you fibbing?" etc.
Blame the consumers that can barely keep affording to live, the companies that profit billions have to lie to us.
Hire a sociologist to help with those reflections Sabine, this is a social phenomenal, not a scientific one and it shows you didn't have the best script. Love your work!
End consumers in no nation are responsible for more than 25% of national fossil emissions.
The rest? Business, Institutions, Governments: BIG emitters.
Why draw attention to 25% of the issue and fail to mention the 75% end?
And in 25 nations, the world's largest fossil producers responsible for over 99.7% of emissions, that ratio of end consumer emission to total emissions is closer to 1:20.
Looking at you USA, Russia, China, India, Canada, Germany..
California Insider did a great green washing interview.
Including buying solar CCs, then using coal fired sources for peak usage in AM and PM periods.
Most of the solar power is unused.
Bundle the solar CCs with the coal power and you have a winner.
I... don't really worry about this. The main reason I don't is that electricity production and transportation account for about half of all carbon emissions. Me getting a product that produces 50% less carbon is meaningless. You mentioned not sweating the small stuff, and that's exactly what all this is focused on. If companies go carbon neutral, then my spending habits won't need to change because the companies will change it, and my buying actually green products won't have enough of an impact, it's the lobbies and people running the companies that do so.
Plus, honestly, I'm poor. Not homeless, obviously, but I don't have extra money to spend on the more expensive eco-friendly products. Or extra money to spend on much of anything. I routinely have to ask my family for financial help just to get _bad_ groceries.
My thoughts?
My first effort to be enviramental friendly was: "Stop buying stuff that will shortly end up in the basement or attic."
Green labeled or not, buying less things, in my opinion is the best way to reduce your carbon footprint.
It helped me to work less days/hours and doing more stuff I really like, now finding out I earned at least twice the amount of money I actualy needed for living.
☺
To my advantage, I like biking a lot. The gained spare hours I spent on my bike helped me to get physically in better shape.
In manager-talk: A win-win situation!
(Disclaimer) If the better physics make me live twice as long as I would before, the "carbon footprint gain" could be reduced dramatically. 🤔
Yes, right 😊
Hallo Sabine! Ich hätte eine Frage und wollte ein paar Dinge loswerden. Ersteinmal finde ich es großartig, wie sie über Physik aufklären - ich bin auf dem Gebiet nicht weiter gekommen als mir im Gymnasium beigebracht wurde, aber Sie haben mir gezeigt, dass dieser "mystische" Ort eigentlich gar keiner ist. Ihre objektive Art und Weise ist absolut einzigartig und wenn ich mehr Ahnung auf dem Gebiet hätte, würde ich es genauso machen wie sie. Bevor ich hier alles vergesse. Es ist eine simple Frage: Was halten sie von dem Newsportal Scinexx? Ist es seriös oder wird dort eher auf "Schlagzeilenmachen" geachtet? Ich wünsche ihnen einen schönen Tag!
MfG Vralr
thanks sabine - we appreciate what you cover.
I am sick of all the commercials nowadays: marketing nowadays is not about the (proposed) qualities of the product itself but about the socio-political views of the company that makes them.
Exact!!!..... It`s all about CONTROL....FEAR.... DOMINANCE... POWER.... AND SO ON...
Your hair looks nice! Thanks for the great video as always. Wishing you a wonderful day 😊
As a renewable energy engineer, I have to admit that, unfortunately, the same applies to renewable energy sources like wind and PV as well. They are not nearly as environment-friendly as the average person thinks.
The question to ask is: On what scale? Compared to what? Well, compared to fossil fuels: Production, refining, shipping, distributing, and finally burning of fossil fuels - a one time use, to be repeated in necessarily inefficient (~20!%) engines. Wind and solar clearly aren't all 'clean' but for one there is room for improvement, and for another their environmental 'debit' is amortized over fucking decades, not minutes as in combustion.
@@mv80401 I can answer your questions in some amount of detail afterwards but before I do so, I would just like to say I don't think you realize that ramping up the generation 'capacity' of renewable energy sources necessitates increased consumption of fossil fuels to fill in for their rather long periods of inactivity. Their intermittent nature makes them highly unreliable as stable sources of energy. I can't even count the number of times I have had to wait for months (not days or weeks but months!) to commission a windfarm controller simply because there wasn't enough wind. Germany (where I currently) live is a perfect example (a cautionary tale, in fact) of such a policy.
Just want to mention that I haven't even enumerated the practical environmental downsides of an increased reliance on renewable energy souces like PV and wind for energy generation.
Being better than the alternative is already a huge improvement
@@usmanshahid8069 PV and CST offsets the time when the wind does not blow, and so does the wind simply blowing ESLEWHERE. Obviously that works the other way, too, with wind offsetting the time there is low irradiance. Then there's battery systems for storing energy while it's being generated and dispersing it during dunkelflaute. There's also the fact that not everywhere is like Germany - I live in Western Australia and probably PV alone, with some battery storage here and there, could meet all our needs. Lastly, there are other sources to firm renewables that aren't fossil fuel driven, like pumped hydro and nuclear. If you are really what you say you are, you should know all of this...
@@PinataOblongata God, there are so many flaws in your argument that it would take pages to respond to all of them. :)
First, I don't need to explain my credentials to anyone. Suffice it to say, I am well-qualified to answer all your points in detail - I have an MSc. in power engineering from one of Germany's top technical universities and have worked at a 300 kW coal test rig as an intern (along with my 8+ years experience in the renewable energy field) but due to space and time constraints, I'll keep my response short.
Your basic assumption is that power being generated elsewhere will be able to compensate for the inactivity of renewable energy sources. You cite PV as an example but it's equally as intermittent as wind. In a lot of places, the low wind season coincides with winter. How are you going to expect PV to compensate for low wind output?
No battery system is capable of large amounts of energy storage for long periods of time. And our batteries (as well as PV cells) at the moment are composed of substances that are either toxic or difficult to mine or difficult to dispose off (in an environtment-friendly manner) or a combination of all three. Batteries have a finite lifespan and their performance progressively deteriorates over time even before they have reached the end of their life. Perhaps you would be comfortable sending them off to underdeveloped countries for disposal since then it wouldn't be your problem anymore. That would still not be good for the planet as a whole.
I don't blame you because to an average layman, a mixture of different renewable sources seems like a perfectly good solution - until and unless you actually have some real-world experience with them.
Cute that Sabine had to look up "fib". Reminds me of the time I tried to order a meatless breakfast in Bielefeld-- it does exist BTW-- and I swear I was using the right words from my German-English dictionary. Finally, I relented and said "Big Breakfast" and the whole joint sprang into action to get me one of those. Then I gave back the meat portion. Or maybe I ate the whole thing as a non-committed vegetarian at the time. The aroma was probably very enticing. In fact, I'm still remembering it. Where was I? Oh yeah, don't eat meat, it's not eco friendly.
I realised that yeah, it's bad to have companies import and sell goods more cheaply from overseas/interstate/internationally than just sell more local products but I'm buying the bags of frozen fruit and vegetables and the packaged snacks that have the best value for me, rather than buying more fresh, unprocessed fruit and veg, that'll go off in my fridge because I really don't want to spend extra time preparing and cooking it. As for cleaning products I try to go for a mix of economy and genuine environmental benefits. It irks me how many big corporations have more eco-friendly options available but the company still sells their normal products but I still buy them because hey, cheap/on special.
I think in my case I should also focus on attributes like overall lifespan of things like phones and clothing that do cause more drastic issues from demand and disposal.
What would be most efficient is if the local vegetables & co. would be processed into food by someone who cooks for dozens ore even hundreds of people in a local soup kitchen, so that you could benefit from an economy of scale in cooking like with industrially produced food while still not needing to transport the food a long way.
@@jannikheidemann3805 Then issues of time available to get this soup, having means to transport myself and a supply of soup and of storing it come into play. It's something that I would parasite partake of at least sometimes though.
Excellent presentation with a lot of very useful information. No suprise though, your content is consistently top notch.
"organic foods" is a great example of greenwashing, all foods are organic except for maybe salt
But Himalayan pink salt I bought says "certified organic"!!!
it drives me crazy when corporations or ppl try to greenwash meat and dairy.
Livestock is impossible to make green, and that grass fed bs is even more harmful than FACTORY FARMS.
this should be obvious given that factory farms are made for efficiency and minimum expenses, which results in less land and food used per kg of meat.
True
Apple does all they can to avoid repairing a product being easy or affordable in order to sell a new one. They also started the trend of selling less accessories in the box so that you will buy other product like airpods or chargers
My old computer from the early 90s shows a "energy star" label (on the top right) when booting up. So these old machines are quite energy efficient it seems :D
Not by today's standards.
Watts per gigafloatingpointopperation has significantly reduced since the "90s.
@@jannikheidemann3805 I love a Chromebook because it stays completely cold.
It's like products that say on label: No GMO or No Preservative on product that can't and never have ones like milk GMO free (GMO milk didn't ever exist).
A problem with net-zero is that it does not scale. We cannot all install solar panels to generate electricity during the day, and then use electricity generated from fossil fuels at night, and claim we've achieved net-zero. Displacing fossil fuelled generation during the day is better than nothing, but it's a really low hanging fruit.
How could anyone claim net-zero has been achieved in your example? Fossil fuels are still being burned. I don't think anyone is doing that.
The problem of energy storage to achieve renewable energy at night etc is much talked about nowadays.
What does scale is if you during the night use wind power that is often available during the night and if it isn't, than you could burn gas produced using surplus renewable energy from the times and places that have an overproduction of energy. It's for example hard to run powerlines from the Sahara to Berlin to use the solar power there, but transporting methane liquefied using solar energy in a ship powered by wind and methane to be distributed in the german gas pipe network is more feasible.
nuclear
@@kedrednael Yes, it is much talked about.
@@nahoj.2569 Yes, nuclear is a solution. But if we use that, then the solar panels are largely a waste of effort.
Everybody can now order a video from Sabine by sponsoring her.
I have to now clam , just cause Im fuck?
Sabine? She sounds good? She isn't she already said that
..
Fib
Helping PLANET WILD already since recently 🙋♂️
Thanks! You are surprising! please keep it up
Thank you from the entire team!
Ah yes... Apple. The leader of the antirepair trend in computing surely is green.
best science news i have been able to find in quite a while. please keep up the great work
So Adobe Premiere is artifical coloring and GMO-free?
It is so comforting that there is somebody knows what I need and do not need to know.
Pls make a video on the new room temp superconductor LK -99. Love your vids
Oh my gosh those little owls 🦉 😍 🥹. Thanks for that.
Imagine thinking Apple is even slightly eco friendly when they're one of the most egregious cases of producing e-waste by locking everything out of everything else whenever they feel like they can sell more shit that way, which is generally always.
its a great example of fibbing
Chinese brands are worse. The literally print e-waste. They don't have certified services, so their products don't end up refurbished.
I love all your videos, but this one was outstanding! I only hope people pay attention.
Greenwashing is everywhere 😡 But the
effects of it are devastating 🌎🌍🌏💔
And we as consumers are in very large parts lazy, dishonest and not willing to change our investments and habits ourselves too. So we are not better than the companies believe me! Thank You for covering!
If Carbon Dioxide emissions were actually the driving force for climate change, it would make a difference... but they don't. One can look at carbon dioxide levels and glacial ice ages to see the proof that carbon dioxide levels are not the driving force for climate change. I am all for reducing pollution emissions, but carbon dioxide is not one of them. If carbon dioxide was the cause of so much heat, then explain the ice ages when there was much more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
We should focus on real issues that matter such as making the recycle label actually mean that the product can be easily recycled. Making sure garbage collection companies actually perform the recycling of the trash in a much better way, and not offload the duty of sorting trash to the human, but rather the garbage company itself.
I saw in my store toilet paper labeled as being a "100% recycled" product. I mean, I try to do my part, but I draw the line at using recycled toilet paper.
5:45 Buy a set of 10 when they are on sale 😂
Wonderful video Sabine, and took your advice about your sponsor too. You didn't mention packaging (which may be a video in its own right), but if I'm searching for a product in the supermarket I first stand back to see if any have environmentally-friendly packaging (glass, can, cardboard, or none) and buy plastic only as a last resort.
Thank you!!!❤❤👍👍👍👍
There used to be an idea known as "false advertising" now known as "creative marketing".
@SabineHossenfelder_ thank you but I think jannekheidemann3805 pointed out the biggest hypocrisy of "going Green" companies with their unrepairable planned obsolescence
It’s always good to have confirmation that one’s sugar is fat free. 😮
THANK YOU SO MUCH. YOU HAVE DONE YOUR HOMEWORK. AND IT SHOWS!!!! A MUST WATCH AND LEARN VIDEO!!!!
What a teacher Sabine is! I really wish I could, someday, talk to her about Maxwell equations, Fourier Series and Laplace transform 😊 (yes, I am autistic)
Good video Sabine. Whenever I see an interesting new science headline I look forward that you will be covering it 🙂
Thanks a lot for bringing up that interesting and important topic. You are totally right.
I'm going to make a bot that leaves that comment on every one of her videos
Who continues saying Germans have no sense of humour, you prove them wrong with every of your videos. Love you, Sabine.
@7:28 Saying it's even partly because it's 'difficult' to get it right is a bit of a dodge. What it is is difficult to get it right _and not lose profits._ Not including that in your statement makes you a suspected shill for those companies.
Another good example is "ocean plastic". It became popular with the discovery of the North Pacific garbage patch => "plastic island"; plastics are being recovered from our oceans but consumer good makers are riding on that wave: sneakers are being advertised as "made from/with ocean plastic". Checking the fine print reveals that a) the material used is not "ocean plastic but "ocean bound/river plastic" and b) only 10% of the material of the sneakers are linked to that
@-SabineHossenfelder Da fühle ich mich sehr geehrt, dies von dir 😃