Gore’s “green” home uses more energy now than it did before

When last we left you, The King of Green Al Gore was using 20 times more electricity in his home compared to the average household. In fact, the Tennessee Center for Policy Research reported in February of 2007 that “Gore’s mansion, [20-room, eight-bathroom] located in the posh Belle Meade area of Nashville, consumes more electricity every month than the average American household uses in an entire year, according to the Nashville Electric Service (NES).”

Naturally, Gore responded indignantly, without really addressing the core charge made by the TCPR. With that in mind, it’ll be interesting to see how/if/when he responds to their latest report:

NASHVILLE – In the year since Al Gore took steps to make his home more energy-efficient, the former Vice President’s home energy use surged more than 10%, according to the Tennessee Center for Policy Research.

“A man’s commitment to his beliefs is best measured by what he does behind the closed doors of his own home” said Drew Johnson, President of the Tennessee Center for Policy Research. “Al Gore is a hypocrite and a fraud when it comes to his commitment to the environment, judging by his home energy consumption.”

In the past year, Gore’s home burned through 213,210 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity, enough to power 232 average American households for a month.

In February 2007, An Inconvenient Truth, a film based on a climate change speech developed by Gore, won an Academy Award for best documentary feature. The next day, the Tennessee Center for Policy Research uncovered that Gore’s Nashville home guzzled 20 times more electricity than the average American household.

After the Tennessee Center for Policy Research exposed Gore’s massive home energy use, the former Vice President scurried to make his home more energy-efficient. Despite adding solar panels, installing a geothermal system, replacing existing light bulbs with more efficient models, and overhauling the home’s windows and ductwork, Gore now consumes more electricity than before the “green” overhaul.

Since taking steps to make his home more environmentally-friendly last June, Gore devours an average of 17,768 kWh per month –1,638 kWh more energy per month than before the renovations – at a cost of $16,533. By comparison, the average American household consumes 11,040 kWh in an entire year, according to the Energy Information Administration.

Ya know, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to “go green.” In fact, I use many “green” cleaning products around my house, and signed on the first year I worked at the 8-5 with the county’s recycling service, where they come and pick up scrap and discarded paper used by businesses. I make sure the lights in the occupied offices are turned off when the occupant leaves for a meeting or for the day. Some of my appliances are Energy Star compliant. I’m considering starting to use those reusable grocery bags that are becoming so fashionable (I have way too many plastic grocery bags as it is).

That said, I don’t consistently recycle here at the house, and don’t go out of my way to not drive. I am not obsessive at all about any of this stuff. I just think conserving in general is a good idea – after all, who wants to be wasteful? (Now if only I could effectively apply that when it comes to spending money …. )

What I object to the most about the Green Brigade’s fanaticism is the fact that many prominent greenies are flaming hypocrites, like Gore. They’ll tell you to go buy a hybrid, but it’s not uncommon to see them driving around town in an SUV or flying across the world in a jumbo jet. Not only that, but I get sick of these people trying to make others feel guilty for drinking out of a plastic bottle versus drinking water from a glass, and am irked by people preaching to others that “we’re all gonna die soon” if we don’t throw our cans in the recycling bin. I also get sick of my opinion on gw being dismissed as though I’m a conspiracy theorist/world-is-flat-type.

Also, clearly there’s no desire from the other side for serious, healthy debate on this issue. It’s their way or no way. In some cases, green fanatics have argued that skeptics be punished in various ways, in ways that would harm their career, or worse, ruin their lives (“Nuremburg-style” trials, anyone?). The green fanatics in Congress want to mandate what kind of light bulb you get to use. Screw that.

I could go on and on.

Funny thing is, most of the conservatives I talk to take the same approach to ‘going green’ as I do – they don’t go overboard with it, but they conserve for conserving’s sake, and use certain green products because they work better and/or smell better, and they drive fuel efficient cars because it saves them money at the pump, money they’d like to use on a big steak dinner or a trip to Australia. But to knee-jerk green fanatics, because skeptics are, well, skeptical of their claims and don’t believe there is a “consensus” on the cause of gw, automatically those skeptics are branded as heretics who “want to destroy the earth.”

Whatever.

As far as “green policy” goes, I’m pretty much with Newt Gingrich’s mindset on it (except for his appearance in that “We” ad with Nancy Pelosi – yikes). I think he realizes that the whole “global warming” issue is not going to go away, and understands that – thanks a great deal to untruthful global warming alarmists like Gore and media outlets who eagerly parrot what he and other ‘experts’ have to say on gw – conservatives will be forever be left behind on the issue rather than being seen as a constructive part of it, so he’s proposed free-market alternatives to their big gov’t ‘solutions.’ His attitude seems to be, well, ok, if this is how the masses want to view global warming – and that is as a “crisis” – then let the ‘fixes’ for the so-called ‘crisis’ primarily come from the free market and private sector.

I’ve read elsewhere at a few other conservative blogs the opinion that Gingrich has “sold out” and become part of the enviro-nut movement, but if you read more at his site (and from his book “Real Change“) you’ll see that that’s far from the truth.

Other conservatives may disagree with me on this, but thankfully on the green issue I’ve found that conservatives are able to debate each other constructively on the issue, where as on the far left end, they don’t want debate. They just want to dominate it.