Live Earth - is it green?

Counting the carbon cost

11 Apr 07 - The ‘greenest concert’ of the summer is how Live Earth has been billed so far, but a day after the main acts were announced for the global gigs and people in some quarters have been slamming the whole idea as being counter productive to the cause.

The huge event has been set up to galvanise support for the fight against global warming but complaints have started appearing on the internet with bloggers asking if pop stars really are the right kind of people to be singing the merits of going green.

The likes of Madonna, Snow Patrol and Black Eyed Peas have all signed up, and hundreds of artists will require transporting by air to their respective concerts to be staged in London, Sydney, Brazil, South Africa, Japan, Shanghai and New Jersey. One act who expressed concern about a concert of this size are Muse.

Frontman Matt Bellamy told 6 Music that it seemed hypocritical to support something that could have an adverse affect on the climate:

“ Private jets for climate change, not sure about it that seems to be a bit on edge really– that’s an issue really, so we need to think about it!” Organisers have defended the decision to plough ahead with the music events claiming that the concerts will have eco-friendly electricity and sustainable lighting.

Ashok Sinah, a director of Stop Climate Chaos, a group involved in the event, said:

“The ball to a certain extent is in our court, we have got to make sure that the people that come to us post concert, are actively engaged and get involved in the campaign.” He also added that criticisers should not be pointing the finger of blame at pop stars:

“They have to reduce carbon emissions, we have to do reduce carbon emissions, and in just the same way that we may look at a pop star and say, ‘you use more carbon than I do,’ then people from Africa could look at us and think we don’t go flying around everywhere, I have met people in Africa who haven’t even made a phone call let alone get on a plane.”

Adrian Larkin