NYT: Wal-Mart intends to sell 100,000,000 compact fluorescent light bulbs. CFs save an enormous amount of electricity, run 5-10 times longer, and give basically the same quality of light. There’s no reason not to use them. This is the latest chapter in Wal-Mart’s year-old discovery that being environmentally friendly will make them far more profitable in both the short and the long run. Wal-Mart can be a force for tremendous social good, and I hope they come around to doing so fully.
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Expanding on a comment in the article, Wal-Mart has actually teamed up with the Environmental Defense group, and are in the market for someone to move to their HQ in Arkansas to figure out every conceivable change they can make that will be both environmentally friendly as well as profitable. Their CEO has said he wants Wal-Mart to eventually become carbon neutral, and it looks like they are constructing the foundation from which this might one day be possible.
I levy a lot of criticism on walmart, but in all fairness this is an encouraging sign post for a public corporation to do this. My only concern is that they will limit themselves only to green initiatives which also save money, but possibly it will be a catalyst to exploit all profitable energy saving concepts.
From 1992-1996 I worked for the EPA helping to launch their public-private partnership known as “Green Lights”. The environmental savings from compact fluorescents is enormous and this is a fantastic step in the right direction.
Coincidentally, I just happened to watch Robert Greenwald’s “WalMart: The High Cost of Low Price” tonight. Wal-Mart has a long way to go and I will still never shop there.
Costco manages to deliver better product at comparable pricing without putting undue stress on public assistance or demanding draconian corporate socialism that destroys small communities.
Better yet, I’ll buy my compact fluorescents at the corner HW store (there’s still one in my neighborhood) and keep the multipliers local.
The concept of a eco-conscious Wal-Mart really creeps me out. There’s is nothing green about their development plans–paving over that much square acreage is the worst kind of sprawl development–or their buying habits.
I’m glad they are selling (and hopefully using) CFBs and Energy Savers electronics, but I’d be happier if they dissolved entirely and people used their dollars to support their local hardware stores and mom-&-pop shops.