[pg]

If you honestly want to be "green" you can make changes to your personal behaviour (such as using CFLs, recycled packaging etc.) and not rely on some company to hold your hand

But surely hosting is by definition an area where you need a company to do it for you? Things like what you eat, how you travel, etc, you can control yourself, but the whole point of shared hosting is that you don't own or even see the server.

[daragh]

The other point I made was that even if they were offering "green" VPSs it doesn't mean they're going to have a "green" and "non-green" power cables running in to the building and they put your VPS in the rack hooked up to the "green" one. They`d probably just do exactly what you can do yourself, pay someone to offset the environmental cost.

One of the main things about purposefully choosing "green" companies, often at increased cost, is that you are influencing the market based on your preference. Choosing environmentally friendly products encourages companies to offer them (I also appreciate that this is why many abuse the term).

Furthermore, if you wish to brand your site or company as "green" you should probably do a little more than choose a "green" VPS provider lest you further obviate the term.