I know Willie Mitchell drives a Prius, and has been trying to convince Canuck players like Kesler and Bieksa to ditch their Escalade’s (or at least go hybrid)!

Posted by DobberHockey_Angus from British Columbia on 03/26/09 at 03:30 PM ET

Last September, one of the Canucks PR people was mentioning to me and a couple friends I was with that Mitchell also cycles to the arena much of the time.

Posted by Alanah McGinley from British Columbia on 03/26/09 at 03:43 PM ET

That doesn’t surprise me - many of the Canucks live close to the arena in Yaletown. It is nice to see rich athletes buying in to this initiative as well. As lame as it sounds, every little bit does help in terms of the environment.

On that subject, with his interest in this field as well as his heavy involvement with Right to Play, Andrew Ference is quite the humanitarian.

Posted by DobberHockey_Angus from British Columbia on 03/26/09 at 03:51 PM ET

Absolutely. And you just reminded me of something I really enjoyed last year—Ference’s Africa diary. Pretty interesting if you haven’t seen it.  Some great photos, too.

Posted by Alanah McGinley from British Columbia on 03/26/09 at 03:55 PM ET

Oops. That diary is from 2007, not last year. Time flies on me…

Posted by Alanah McGinley from British Columbia on 03/26/09 at 03:56 PM ET

Ference even got Big Z to climb Mount Kilimanjaro last summer to raise money for Right to Play. I remember there was a special on it a few months’ back on the NHL Network (up here in Canada at least).

Posted by DobberHockey_Angus from British Columbia on 03/26/09 at 03:58 PM ET

The hybrids are just marketing hogwash. Its not “green” at all. For example, when you take in consideration the total combined energy from all the electrical, fuel, transportation, and materials (particularly the nickle batteries), the Hummer will last three times longer than a Prius and use less combined energy doing it. Its something like $3.25 per mile for 100,000 expected lifetime miles for the Prius and like $1.75 or so for 300,000 expected lifetime miles for the Hummer. All hybrids do is make people feel good about themselves.

Hell, not even Hydrogen cars are all that green as the most cost efficient way to produce hydrogen right now is by making it from natural gas in a process that releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

The lesson is that if you get a good marketing program behind a product, you can sell it to any sucker (and charge a premium because of it). The entire diamond industry is based on this theory.

Posted by UMFan from Colorado on 03/26/09 at 04:17 PM ET

I won’t get into this too deep… I think people that go hybrid have their hearts in the right place, but yeah, it’s not really doing much. The real issues with carbon is that countries all over the world—primarily China and the U.S.—are too reliant on coal-burning power plants.

Three Mile Island and Chernobyl have scared us away from the cleanest, most efficient, and most economically sensible source of energy the world (currently, and feasibly) has to offer.

Wind power could be a great thing, but is a long way from being where it needs to be to consistently supply energy to massive urban areas. We’ll see what happens, that’s for sure…

Posted by Nathan from Jonny Ericsson's ice cream truck on 03/26/09 at 05:57 PM ET

Regardless of the actual impact some of these initiatives have, the biggest benefit is bringing awareness. We’ve all been told to “go green” and its pushed more and more by the news and product marketing, but its easy to ignore commercials. Seeing your favorite player make some simple lifestyle changes can make a person think about what they can do.

Regardless of your stance on global warming and other eco campaigns, it’s foolish to not attempt to improve our living standards and be less wasteful.

The NHL can do their part too by not building more power hungry empty ice rinks in the desert.

Posted by Nate A from Dark side of the moon on 03/26/09 at 06:09 PM ET

When I was younger my dad had a Geo Metro with a 3 cylinder engine made by Suzuki for their motorcycles. It got 50 mpg and cost $8,000. But no, now they sell “hybrids” that are $20,000+ and most of which get worse gas mileage.
And GM wonders why their going out of business. I’d buy a metro right now if they still made those things, instead they have hybrid impalas.

And as you guys noted, my jeep that gets 15-20mpg is better for the environment since it’s already lasted for 250,000 miles and has no signs of slowing down while these hybrids are going to be falling apart and needing their internal batteries replaced at 100,000 miles.

Also, not all NHL players are trying to go green. Marc Andre Fleury just recently bought a new Lambo. I bet it gets about 10 mpg.

If they really want to help the environment, then maybe the new Pens arena shouldn’t be called Consol Energy Arena, a coal company, and instead go with the Beaver Valley Power Station, a local nuclear plant, or Somerset Wind Arena, named after the local wind power plant.

Chances are Consol Energy won’t even be around in 20 years when its naming rights are up.

Posted by kstewy16 on 03/26/09 at 06:49 PM ET

Seeing your favorite player make some simple lifestyle changes can make a person think about what they can do.

Nate, I’ll think about taking them seriously when I see sports stars, movie stars and politicians move en mass out of their 5,000 square feet mansions and move into an 1,800 square foot house. Applaud them if you must, but really, there isn’t all that much substance there.

Posted by UMFan from Colorado on 03/27/09 at 03:07 AM ET