Ms Heaton makes an unconventional point about an "unsustainable consumer culture" and its relationship to the presumed environmental value of conventional vs electric cars, or windmills vs oil- or coal-fired power plants.  

While I concur with her point about the culture, I would comment on her specific arguments related to the choices available to us.

For example, her analysis (as far as the car example goes) appears to assume that the choice is between building a new, electric car or continuing to use an old, conventional one.   But assuming that new cars (of any kind) are going to be built at some point would in fact be a much safer assumption -- and all of the materials and the factory required to build a new Toyota Prius will, give or take, be required to build a new Toyota Camry.

Therefore, her analysis I think ought to consider the marginal environmental cost of the alternatives for building and operating a new car.  Given that a new car will be built and operated, which type has the lowest life-cycle environmental cost?  In the case of the electric car, the main determinant of its environmental impact is the source of the electricity it uses (which factor Ms Heaton has not mentioned in her analysis). 

Which brings us to windmills (and other forms of renewable energy). 

In the windmill case, the environmental costs of building a wind farm or a coal-fired steam turbine may be quite different (the conventional plant may have the lower first cost), but the environmental cost of the fuel to operate the wind turbines over the 15-year lifetime of the wind farm is zero.