How Cow Farts Are Killing The Earth
By admin
Ready for some real off the chest ideas?
We all want to do our part to help the earth. I think everyone will nod their heads that the world is in a delicate place.
All thanks to us.
Water usage, green house gases, trash/pollution, and rain forest devastation. If the world were to crumble apart tomorrow, it’s no one’s fault but our own.
Sometimes ignorance is bliss. We recycle our cans, jars and egg cartons. We take quick showers. And we try to walk or bike instead of drive.
All the while, thinking we’re doing our part.
But are we?
Cowspiracy
Last week Dan and I watched a new to us documentary, Cowspiracy.
For years, we’ve been back and forth on our stance on beef.
High quality beef is both expensive and hard to fine. Consuming hormones isn’t our thing yet neither is going broke.
When diagnosed with anemia, I brought beef back into our dinner rotations a few times a month. That was after 2 years of not eating it at all while I was vegan.
So what changed? Why are we not eating it now?
This documentary.
Yes, documentaries are always extreme. They want you to feel they way they feel and react. Sometimes, they don’t cover all the points or use biased research, but they do lead you to think.
Remember that time I went vegan because of a documentary? Yes, I fall for it.
And I fell for this one.
Cowspiracy is documentary on agriculture’s influence on our environment.
It’s influence is much larger than I ever knew.
Why a conspiracy?
Because no one tells us how much the cattle industry (or any agricultural sector) affects the environment. And they don’t want to. Beef is a MULTI billion dollar industry. Exports alone brings in over $ 5 Billion per year.
So let’s get to it…
Why are we giving up beef completely?
The Environmental Impact Of Our Food
While we’re all trying to take fast showers to help conserve water, we’re doing dittly squat.
According to WaterFootPrint.Org, domestic use accounts for just 4% of our total water footprint.
92% of the water used is for agriculture. 92%!
(the other 4% is industrial use if you were curious).
Okay, so back to agriculture. Of that 92%, meat consumption is 30%. And of course the biggest sector is beef.
How much water does it take to produce 1 lb of beef?
1,847 gallons (give or take as each report seemed to give a slightly different number).
To put that into perspective, chicken takes just 518 gallons. Which of course is a lot, but less than 1/3 the amount for beef.
As of January 2015, cattle inventory in America was 89.9 million! That’s a lot of our scarce drinking water going to grow these animals.
So reason #1 we’re avoiding beef… to help with the water footprint!
California is in a drought yet has anyone thought of ways to help the situation? Not watering the lawn or filling a pool is so insignificant when you look at the numbers.
Sustainable drinking water is a threat to the globe. Yet, we’re dumbing thousands upon thousands gallons of water to meat.
Food for thought.
Greenhouse gases are leading to global warming. Carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide numbers continue to rise with industry, population, and agriculture.
First things first… why do these gases cause global warming?
The heat becomes trapped beneath the gases, leading to the warming effect.
We are all aware that cars are a giant cause for CO2 emissions. Walking or biking as much as possible is a great benefit to not only your body but to the environment.
But what about CH4… Methane.
Methane is the 2nd most prevalent greenhouse gas in the US.
And we know it as cow farts.
Yes, I said it.
Cow farts.
What affect does it have on our climate?
According to LifeForChange.Org…
Methane’s lifetime in the atmosphere is much shorter than carbon dioxide (CO2), but it’s more efficient at trapping radiation than CO2. Pound for pound, the comparative impact of CH4 on climate change is 25 times greater than CO2 over a 100-year period.
And for those of people that are arguing global warming isn’t a real thing…
Pictures don’t lie. This is a Himalayan glacier clearly melting away. For those that like that kind of stuff, I recommend watching Chasing Ice. It’s amazing and eye opening.
Back to methane and cows:
Let’s do some math…
A single cow can release between 70-120 kg of Methane per year.
We learned there are 89.9 million cattle in the country.
How much methane are they releasing?
= 6,293,000,000 – 10,788,000,000 kg of methane PER YEAR.
Because I like to compare…
How much gas is emitted per year from cars?
More math…
The average car drives 12,000 miles per year and averages 25.5 miles per gallon.
= 470.6 gallons of gas used per person (average).
There are 17.7 pounds of CO2 released per gallon.
= an average of 8,320 pounds of CO2 PER car.
= 3773 kg (to match)
But since I want the total, there are 253 million cars driving around in the US.
=954,569,000,000 kg of carbon dioxide PER YEAR.
So while, transportation is the #1 green gas emission, we can see that cattle is extremely up there.
For me, I can’t not drive to work. My gym is a 40 minute drive from my home. I can’t park my car and can not bike on the interstate.
But what I can do is decrease my personal gas emission by cutting back on the amount of beef we eat.
Important point…
Remember that CO2 levels may be greater, but CH4 (methane) is 25x more harmful to the atmosphere?
By cutting down cow farts we can make a huge impact!
How Can We All Do Better?
Do I expect everyone to read this and agree with me? No, of course not.
Does everyone need to stop consuming beef? No, if that were to happen think of the devistation? The jobs lost, the money lost and the lives changed. Restaurants and fast food restaurants would go out of business, grocery stores would lose huge profits…
Our economy on a grand scale would suffer.
It’s crazy how one thing can have such a waterfall affect, right?
But we can decrease the demand enough to bring down emissions. And we can push for the cattle to have a better diet that will decrease their methane release without decreasing their numbers.
How?
- Educate. Remember how ignorance is bliss? Well, that’s ignorant thinking. If you’re like me and your friends love talking healthy living and fitness then bringing up a topic like this shouldn’t be strange. Educate your friends and try to let them convince themselves to limit their beef intake.
- Choose game meat over beef. Bison releases 1/3 of the amount of methane and uses a significant less amount of water. And bison is delicious, if you haven’t tried it, do!
- Fight for better feed. The feed that is given to most cattle is not high quality. If you eat processed foods, what happens? You find yourself gassy. Same goes for cows, if their diet was made of higher quality grass and feed, methane release would go down.
- Half your beef intake and avoid fast food joints. Try to eat 1-2 meals a week that are veggie based, a few meals of poultry and then continue to enjoy you beef fix. Get creative. We’ve actually brought 1-2 vegan meals back into our dinners each week. It’s been a blast… Lentil stuffed peppers below, yum!
- Continue to do the little things. Recycling, take the walks and fast showers, those things help us stay conscious about our world. And makes us feel like “good people” which is always a plus.
Baked stuffed peppers filled with lentil, mushrooms, garlic, onions and marinara sauce. Baked at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.
Sources:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/13/food-water-footprint_n_5952862.html
http://www.beefusa.org/beefindustrystatistics.aspx
http://www3.epa.gov/climatechange/Downloads/ghgemissions/US-GHG-Inventory-2015-Chapter-5-Agriculture.pdf
http://www.latimes.com/business/autos/la-fi-hy-ihs-automotive-average-age-car-20140609-story.html
http://www.americanforests.org/a-carbon-conundrum/