I’ve just moved into a house where one of the flat-mates is a vegetarian charity-worker who is forever planting seedlings and talking of Free Trade. Which is fine. But the other day I was made to feel guilty for using an electric kettle to make a cup of tea - he pointed out that a kettle placed on the gas hob is more energy efficient and thus ‘greener’.
While this may be true, I would have thought that a certain amount of the heat from the gas flame is dispersed and wasted into the kitchen, while the immersed element of the electric kettle would waste fairly little.
There must also be the issue of burning natural gas versus use of electricity (which presumably may come from different sources).
Mundane I know, but could any tell me which is truly nicer to the environment? I already feel like an eco-sinner…
Electric Kettles are (today) almost always made from plastic, which does not transfer heat that good as the metal kettle you put on a gas flame does. This also means, an electric kettle does mainly heat the water, while the gas flame has to heat the metal kettle AND the water.
Also keep in mind, that the electrical power you get from the plug is generated (at least partially) from renewable energy sources (wind, water, etc.) while the gas is a fossil energy source.
So I would reason, the electric kettle is greener. However, is someone can prove me wrong, I’d like to hear your reasoning.
Hm … I completely misunderstood the thread title. I was all prepared to issue forth with … the guy who doesn’t use boiling water is a “green” (i.e., inexperienced) tea drinker; the guy doesn’t use actual tea (in other words, “herbal tea”) in his tea is even greener.
Electric kettle wins, followed by microwave, followed by gas.
Gas is even less efficient if you consider that you usually overfill a kettle or pot, thus wasting water, while with a microwave or electric immersion heater, you usually heat precisely the amount of water you are using.
In any case, it falls into the “don’t sweat the small stuff” category. You’ll probably spend less than $5.00 on energy heating tea in a year. Bike to work once or twice instead of driving if you feel you must assuage your guilt.
Neither of these discussions takes into account the energy used to produce the separate electric tea kettle. Not to mention the extra packaging, shipping, inventory, etc. There are also disposal issues.
While I agree that the separate electric kettle may be more efficient to use, is it really more green, or is it more convenient? I think that, given the existence of a perfectly good stove top kettle, buying an electric kettle is not, overall, very green.
I also agree that it’s a ridiculous distinction – what’s going on with your roommate that he’s so concerned (and competitive) about such a trivial matter?
Say, I’m wondering… Just what kind of tea does your flat-mate drink, Staggerlee? It is organically grown and from a Fair Trade Certified tea plantation, isn’t it? (And I certainly hope that if your flat-mate uses tea-bags they aren’t bleached with chlorine!)
If not, now’s your chance to nip down to the shop, buy some of that Fair Trade organic tea and regain the moral high ground in this little tempest:
"Perhaps my electric kettle is less efficient. I do not concede the point, sir, but even if that is the case, I have the comfort of knowing that my tea is not a product of ruthless exploitation and environmental damage!
"You, on the other hand, drink tea that is flavored with blood! The blood of the workers and the very blood of Mother Earth that was raped and despoiled to produce it!
“For shame, sir! For shame!”
Be careful though, these sorts of things can get out of hand. You may find yourself having to grow your own lentils and use a composting toilet by the time you and your flat-mate finally declare a truce
I hope he grows his own tea and carefully dries is using the time honored processed developed by Buddhist monks in 1000 BCE. Anything less would be uncultured and barbaric.
I take it from the OP, that both, the electric kettle and the stove top kettle are both already existing in this house. So production costs (in energy and pollution) do not have to be taken into account, in this case.
Thanks for the answers, and I confess that the title was deliberately ambiguous so as to lure otherwise unwilling punters toward a pretty dull question. This flatmate isn’t too pious about his muesli and such, it’s just that he rankled me by claiming knowledge in the science of household appliances as well as that of organic soup-making.
And he drinks some sort of uncaffeinated tea substitute - called ‘Redbush Tea’ - so if anyone has any unethical dirt on perhaps the barbarism of producing that, I’d love to know. I’ll have the chap weeping into his beard with remorse by Friday.
Redbush Tea - or rooibos tea - has nothing to do with the tea plant, from which green and black tea is made. It is more like a herbal tea. See here or here. And it is not decaffeinated, the rooibos plant just does not contain any caffeine.
It is becoming more and more popular, though, I as a passionate black and green tea drinker cannot understand it at all. To me rooibos tea just sucks and lacks any joyful taste. But that is only my opinion. Then again, does medicine ever taste good?
I’m coming up with nothing. I did some casual Googling and found a site that said that, as of 2000, there was no rooibos tea that was certified as Fair Trade or under the Ethical Trade Initiative–but that’s hardly a smoking gun. In fact that site made it sound like certification would be relatively easy to achieve for rooibos tea. I didn’t find any evidence of environmental catastrophes or children maimed or sickened by picking rooibos, either.
I’m sorry, Staggerlee, but you may be forced to live with your flat-mate’s smug sneers of moral superiority for awhile–at least as far as hot beverages are concerned. You can only hope that one of these days you’ll spot him eating a veal chop while wearing a shirt made in a Myanmarese prison sweatshop…
