Does being Green have a very un-Green cost to it?

Green Mamba image from Ryan Photographic, found at Play it Green

From the Queens Crap post: The LEED Conspiracy -Queens' Green Crap??? How 'bout the Bronx too??? Oh well...

..."There is no justification for USGBC claims that LEED Certified commercial buildings are using significantly less electricity or have significantly lower greenhouse-gas emission associated with their operations than do conventional buildings," wrote Oberlin College researcher John Scofield in a paper... So why is LEED so popular? Well, it lets politicians cloak themselves in the garb of environmental activism without upsetting real-estate interests..."

Oh Crap!!!

I thought it was just an opinion of mine that LEED ratings were a corporate marketing tool before they were something to improve a buildings' environmental impact. From the time that I took a LEED class and learned that in fact one can get LEED points for choosing less than green approaches and sometimes must choose active, polluting systems over actually passive, green solutions just to earn their points. I guess good publicity has a cost to it? Or does being Green have a very un-Green cost to it? Could the Prius really be worse than a Hummer? Depends on what one believes...

To have real world data to support that opinion is oddly satisfying and pretty fucked up, especially if the information is indeed proven & true. Shit, now I want it to be false!!!

Green is green and standardized ratings don't necessarily have anything to do with it; We can be responsible without ratings; the real question may be will we...?