On Earth Day, I'm wondering: How green are Apple's iPad, Amazon's Kindle, and other e-readers? I assume that printing, binding and transporting a book to a bookstore creates a large carbon footprint -- much larger than creating a digital book and selling it through an electricity-powered e-reader.
The energy accounting gets a little messier if the manufacturing (and eventual demise) of the device itself is included. Or if the deadwood edition is passed around by a library or by a free recycling organization such as The Book Thing of Baltimore. (Remember, some e-readers such as the Kindle don't allow users to exchange books with friends.)
It would be interesting to see a true accounting, by energy experts.