The madness engulfing our planet

We know that energy consumption is bad. So why are manufacturers allowed to get away with producing even more inefficient electrical goods? One of the benefits of LCD monitors over conventional ones is that they run on fewer watts, but thsi trend doesn't extend to flatscreen TVs. Some are more energy efficient, but many others aren't.

What winds me up is that the government still hasn't produced an A-G rating for these devices, or that retailers aren't required to list the consumption on the product info tabs. When I purchased a Freeview hard drive recorder to replace the Freeview box I gave to my parents, I ended up opting for the model with the lowest power consumption (18 watts), but only after I'd manually turned the display box around to see its rating on the back. What winds me up is that government talks a lot of hot air, but actually does very little. So while it and its contemporaries around the world fiddle, the planet burns, when with a bit of common sense we could start making a real difference to the products we buy.