Does Green Mean Environmentally Friendly?

The weather in Tampa at this time of the year is awesome. Low 70's during the day and hardly needing air conditioning in the nights and with spring bringing out the palette of greens in the parks and in the yards, this is easily the best time to visit Florida. My front yard was an exception to the all pervading greenery with dead grass infested with weeds - but not anymore. A couple of days of back-breaking resodding later, my yard looks fine. Not fantastic, just fine. Fine enough to distract the HOA in our deed-restricted community away from my lawn and to some other infractions elsewhere. When I was toiling away resodding, I was reminded of an article I read somewhere that the grass in people's yards is the largest crop in the United States. Not corn, not wheat and certainly not potatoes - it is grass! Imagine the billions of gallons of water, fertilizer, pesticide, and most importantly millions of acres of land that is consumed by this crop that at best serves an aesthetic need and at worst gives backaches to homeowners like me for no reason while being one of the worst crimes against environment.

Between Al Gore style alarmist views on what is happening to the climate and those of people that still dispute climate change (apparently a subtler way of saying global warming) as pure fiction, most people including educated people with good intentions are confused as to what they can do to protect the environment and save it for the future generations. Who is more environmentally friendly - one who drives a Prius to the park everyday so she could jog for a few miles, or one that rides an SUV but recycles, or one that rides a bicycle and drinks the water from the tap? One who installs CFL's in all light fixtures in the sprawling home with jumbo appliances but turns on every light in the home for 4 hours each evening or one who lives in a 600 sft home and has all small dorm sized appliances? I don't have any words of wisdom on this topic because I feel terribly confused but I can tell you that if doing anything that is environmentally unfriendly costs someone more money then one would choose the path that would save money. Sure driving an SUV costs more money and so does drinking bottled water. But it is nearly not expensive enough for many people to quit either.