The Definition of "Green"

Good Afternoon SuperForest!

Jackson here.

I think I may be onto something...

Thinking last night about a subject that has caused me and my fellow neo-environmentalists (Pinks) much consternation and teeth gnashing.

What is "Green"? What does it mean? And what is its opposite?

I think I may have cracked it.

Green literally means: more plants.
Its opposite is black, which means: more smoke/dust.

All carbon based energy tech has at the present two massive problems: When you utilize them they create smoke and it's nasty sibling, dust.

Look around our cities, on the walls of buildings, even in our houses, and you will see the end result of our carbon burning systems: sticky black soot accumulated as dust.

What fights the spread of sticky black soot and smoke? Plants.

Plants, as carbon eating machines, purify the air they take in, absorbing the carbon and turning it into more plant, while exhaling clean oxygen.

So as an ethos, green means to head in a direction away from ash, smoke, and dust, and towards increased plant life, and the subsequent systems that spring up whenever plants take hold (meadows, tundra, fields, forests, and all their respective living ecosystems.)

Obviously, we cannot all live in pristine meadows, but we can live like this:

"Singapore's upcoming EDITT Tower, or the "Ecological Design In The Tropics" Tower, is green inside and out. Designed by the architects at TR Hamzah & Yeang and sponsored by the National University of Singapore, the 26-story structure features a prominent living wall of plants that adds some color, ventilation and dedicated biogas generation.

The plants take up about half of the structure and it's planned that it'll be made from local vegetation. Ramps will connect EDITT to the surrounding shops and offices, so people can pop in for a visit to check out the garden. The building is also covered with photovoltaic panels that'll account for 39.7% of its power, and rainwater will be collected for both plant irrigation and supplying the building's water supply — for flushing a toilet, for instance."

-dvice.com

To incorporate more "green" into our lives means adjusting the balance between plants, technology, and energy usage/production. The hybridization of technology and nature is one of our main interests at SuperForest, and I hope that this definition, as simplistic and seemingly obvious as it is, will help to convince yet more people that a green future is not only possible, it is vital, and that we can all have so much fun creating this new green world together.

Green = More plants.
Black = More smoke.

There you have it. The definition of "Green," and its antonym.

With Love and respect to All,

Jackson

(As always, I mean this only as a discussion-beginner, not as though I had the "final word" on the definition of anything. We SuperForester are scientists at heart, so everything must be vigorously debated and exposed to the bright lights of logic before a consensus can be reached. Let the discussion commence!)

((special thanks to flickr user cdheiner for the exquisite picture of the smokestacks, and to dvice.com for the tip off on the EDITT tower.))



Live the Dream. The creamy, creamy Dream.