Well, this isn't really about the environment, it's also about energy efficiency. I'm all for using energy in the most efficient way possible. It saves money and the extra energy that is saved can go to further productive use.

Where he says "environmentalists" he really means "Luddites", back to the pre-industrial age in his terms.

He makes the point that it is a ridiculous scheme, color choice to save energy. In addition he does save a vast amount of pixel power himself by writing his blog in nearly microscopic print. So maybe he is a pixel "environmentalist"?

For some reason all my attempts at comments to this list are getting blocked as spam, but I'll try again anyway.

I take no issue with trying to save energy for its own sake because this is a quantifiable goal. Energy has a dollar value and as such can be weighed against other factors. For example you might argue that saving $0.03 per year is worth sacrificing the readability of your search engine, and then that is an argument that can be refuted (rather easily, I suspect).

On the other hand, in the context of environmentalism, saving energy becomes "saving the world". Since saving the world is of unquantifiable value, it becomes impossible to frame arguments of the form "is it worth doing" and so it achieves a religious status.

I therefore oppose energy-saving suggestions from environmentalists on general principle. If the same measure were proposed purely for energy saving reasons then I oppose it because a) it doesn't work and b) it wouldn't be worth the trouble even if it did. However were a more effective measure to be presented then I might not object to it.

Google has posted some commentary on the subject.