Re: Read me >>> sharing illuminating journalism
Originally Posted by
vertical_doug
The quote on beef is way off. I think a flight from NY to London in economy is 980 kg/passenger
According to Japanese research, one KG of beef is 36.4 kg of carbon. So 4 lbs of beef is 66 kg of carbon.
Numbers aren't even close.
Even though the guy won a noble prize, I call bullcrap.
I don't understand how you can look flowcharts of the US's, or the world's, greenhouse gas emissisons and determine that eating beef has such an outsize footprint. Here's one for the US:
Agriculture is 8.1%, livestock & manure is 3.3%. Not to pooh-pooh the benefits of a low-impact diet, but these charts show the urgency and opportunity of doing something about how we generate electricity and heat, and travel over roads. Even if that is to get, cook, and eat a hamburger.
My concern is this issue so often comes to the forefront to confuse, frighten, and encourage inaction. "Look, they want to take away our hamburgers!" and "But what about the cow farts?"
Similar to how there's a lot of kvetching about air travel, because we can't see a clear path to significantly greening that up right now (other than purchasing offsets). But if over-the-road transport has 11 times the impact, and there are existing technologies that can radically increase its efficiency, both in miles per gallon and people per trip, why not put that on the front burner and turn that burner on high? You know, put a nice sear on it...
TH
Last edited by thollandpe; 09-30-2019 at 04:28 PM.
Trod Harland, Pickle Expediter
Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced. — James Baldwin
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