PBS Promotes Energy Efficiency, But Ignores the #1 Reason

I like to watch the PBS show “Ask This Old House” on Saturday mornings.  I’m so impressed with the incredible level of professionalism and the cleverness of the solutions these folks come up with.

Whenever it’s possible to mention energy efficiency or solar energy, the plumbing and heating guy, Richard Trethewey (pictured on left), normally dives right in.  He does a great job explaining solar thermal hot water heating, solar photovoltaics, and all manner of solutions that reduce the waste of energy.  But I’m saddened–even a bit shocked–that the show goes out of its way to avoid the environmental implications.  They present these solutions as a way homeowners can reduce their electricity bills, but they’re very careful not to suggest that there are ethical issues here as well.  Is environmentalism some sort of taboo subject?

And isn’t this especially weird behavior for PBS?  It’s not as if we’re talking about Fox News here, and its mission to convince its audience that the whole cleantech industry is the product of big government and left-wing politics, that our scientists are part of this cabal, and that people who care about this stuff are hippy agitators. Readers outside the U.S. may find it hard to believe, but Fox actually has a reasonably large following of people who can’t get enough of this sort of nonsense. That’s decidedly not the case with PBS, however, most of whose programming objectively reports on the science that is central to the issue here.  How strange.

I suppose that, for some reason, the show’s producers are reluctant to come out and say:  “At the same time we’re explaining how to install a new furnace, we’ll make an occasional reference to the fact that our current approach to generating the energy used to fire it up is not sustainable. In fact, it’s ruining our planet, and we all share a collective responsibility to do something about it.”

Is being aware of the decay of our environment and having a conscience really a dangerous thing to admit?  Ask This Old House treats this is as if they were gay people contemplating coming out of the closet in the 1950s, an era in which very few people made the admission, and those few did so at their peril.

Here’s a note to Richard and the show’s producers:  It’s actually a good thing to care about the world around you.  Shout it from the rooftops.  Be proud of it.