| Smuggled booze becomes car fuel |
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2007-06-27, 11:43:29 Hundreds of thousands of gallons of alcohol that people tried to bring into Sweden each year used to get dumped down the drain. Now, they're dumping it into cars' fuel tanks, along with fuel made from poop and animal carcasses. You can read more about this in this article on National Geographic News. Go Sweden! I like this kind of approach. In 2006, the country set a goal of becoming the world's first oil-free country by 2020. It's a laudable goal, and I wish them luck—I think they'll need it. But the tag "oil-free" is a little misleading. People almost everywhere depend on products made in distant factories, often in countries with lax environmental standards. By going for what's most afforable, we're also exporting our environmental impact, while rendering it invisible. It doesn't seem there's any way for the market to deal with the fact that Americans are contributing to pollution in China by buying shoes and computers made there. It seems only agitation within China, or concern about that country's pollution blowing around the world, will force people to change. I just hope that people in the U.S. and Europe put out more of an effort on this front, since they've got the freedom and leisure to speak out about this, whereas in China, people are much more constrained. |