From the meatheads at the Carnegie Institution
Climate: Meat turns up the heat
Stanford, CA—Eating meat contributes to climate change, due to greenhouse gasses emitted by livestock. New research finds that livestock emissions are on the rise and that beef cattle are responsible for far more greenhouse gas emissions than other types of animals. It is published by Climactic Change.
Carbon dioxide is the most-prevalent gas when it comes to climate change. It is released by vehicles, industry, and forest removal and comprises the greatest portion of greenhouse gas totals. But methane and nitrous oxide are also greenhouse gasses and account for approximately 28 percent of global warming activity.
Methane and nitrous oxide are released, in part, by livestock. Animals release methane as a result of microorganisms that are involved in their digestive processes and nitrous oxide from decomposing manure. These two gasses are responsible for a quarter of these non-carbon dioxide gas emissions and 9 percent of total greenhouse gas emissions overall.
The research team, including Dario Caro, formerly of Carnegie and now at the University of Siena in Italy, and Carnegie’s Ken Caldeira, estimated the greenhouse gas emissions related to livestock in 237 countries over a nearly half a century and found that livestock emissions increased by 51 percent over this period.
They found a stark difference between livestock-related emissions in the developing world, which accounts for most of this increase, and that released by developed countries. This is expected to increase further going forward, as demand for meat, dairy products, and eggs is predicted by some scientists to double by 2050. By contrast, developed countries reached maximum livestock emissions in the 1970s and have been in decline since that time.
“The developing world is getting better at reducing greenhouse emissions caused by each animal, but this improvement is not keeping up with the increasing demand for meat,” said Caro. “As a result, greenhouse gas emissions from livestock keep going up and up in much of the developing world.”
Breaking it down by animal, beef and dairy cattle comprised 74 percent of livestock-related greenhouse gas emissions, 54 percent coming from beef cattle and 17 percent from dairy cattle. Part of this is due to the abundance of cows, but it is also because cattle emit greater quantities of methane and nitrous oxide than other animals. Sheep comprised 9 percent, buffalo 7 percent, pigs 5 percent, and goats 4 percent.
“That tasty hamburger is the real culprit,” Caldeira said. “It might be better for the environment if we all became vegetarians, but a lot of improvement could come from eating pork or chicken instead of beef.”
The Carnegie Institution for Science is a private, nonprofit organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with six research departments throughout the U.S. Since its founding in 1902, the Carnegie Institution has been a pioneering force in basic scientific research. Carnegie scientists are leaders in plant biology, developmental biology, astronomy, materials science, global ecology, and Earth and planetary science.
[ADDENDUM]: My thanks to Anthony for pointing out this study. This might be a good time to recommend to people my previous posts on the relationship of plants and animals in the planetary food systems:
Animal, Vegetable, or E.O. Wilson
Finally, one of the larger methane sources on the planet, ironically, is … rice paddies. Lots and lots of organic materials decaying underwater, someone needs to put an end to that terrible practice immediately …
w.
The comments on this post are a laugh-a-minute. Thanks guys for a great start to my Tuesday!
Livestock is not the problem, it is a part of the solution:
asybot says:
July 21, 2014 at 1:27 pm
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I call Bovine Solids emissions.
Beef, beef
The veggie substitute
The more you feed them
The more they toot
The more they toot
The better we feel
So eat more beef with every meal
Was that article written by the Chick-fil-a Cows?
http://www.chick-fil-a.com/Cows/Campaign-History
/grin
Hitler was a vegetarian/vagen. Was he trying to save humanity? He did suffer from gas pains ( just couldn’t fart in front of Eva, too many veggies) . Mind you, he was a socialist. Is there a connection?
So many questions.
asybot says:
July 21, 2014 at 1:27 pm
Zeke and Mosher assured us that averaging absolute temperatures (as in 61.2 C) are scientifically indefensible and have taken issue with Steven Goddard over this very practice. Only temperature anomalies when used to give us a temperature trend can be calculated accurately (with esoteric adjustments of course). So what are the true error bars in the 61.2C temperature claim? And why does it differ so radically from the satellite temperature record which shows no such record temperatures?
Uh, ”if we all became vegetarians” a bunch of us would die of starvation/malnutrition. Generally speaking, livestock convert plant matter that we can’t digest (ever try living off of grass without say cows, sheep, goats, rabbits, guinea pigs, etc…?) into digestible nutrients. Yes, in the developed world we have a lot of grain fed meat products, but a) many of those “meats” still eat a lot of grasses (hay) when they’re on the hoof and b) those grains aren’t exactly the same as the ones we eat with only minor processing and can be viably grown in conditions that “table ready” grains can’t. Chickens being a notable exception but they can eat stuff (like insects & worms) that we don’t particularly want to eat.
bonanzapilot says:
July 21, 2014 at 12:45 pm
As always, the unintended negative consequences are ignored.
http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/264585/speedreads-study-smelling-farts-may-be-good-for-your-health
“While hydrogen sulfide gas is harmful in large doses, the study suggests that “a whiff here and there has the power to reduce risks of cancer, strokes, heart attacks, arthritis, and dementia by preserving mitochondria,” Time reports.”
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Oh dear, I always light my farts ( to save the planet ) and stop them smelling. However, if they won’t burn you know to clear out, it’s real hummer. I guess that’s the methane farts vs the hydrogen sulphide ones.
So I suppose now when I get one the doesn’t light I’ll know to breath deeply and hold, to guard against getting cancer and dementia.
ok, so now it’s cows that emit magical CO2….that stays in the atmosphere
Per T says:
July 21, 2014 at 1:33 pm
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I was thinking along the same lines. If man kind has cut down on the amount of herbivores roaming the landscape (not a lot of bison left here in the lower 48), one would expect a response from the ecosystem. I don’t want to speculate on what that response would be, but it is hard to be opposed to adding animals back to the grasslands.
Also, it is hard to keep up with the greens. They were for animals before they were against them.
Here comes the the DOE grant program to develop pilot lights for certain personal emissions.
The protein, zinc, iodine, and vitamins provided to the diet by beef and dairy are not only good for the developing bodies and minds of children, but cattle are the most effective way to use land to support families. This reduces foraging and hunting and reduces more clearing for farming, if that is a concern.
Peaceful lands where cattle, goats and sheep may safely graze and pasture have always been the mark of a civilized life and culture. Cattle and other domestic animals belong with people, and people belong with the Cow. To have land, and to engage in commercial activity, is not a class privilege. Governments are instituted by people to provide protections for these activities, among other things.
earwig42 says:
July 21, 2014 at 12:22 pm
So.. That means that if we eat the vegetarians we would have less carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide emissions… and there would be fewer obnoxious greens. sounds like a win-win to me.
Yuck! You do what you want, but I’m heading out for a nice thick Delmonico just dripping with blood!
“The research team, including Dario Caro, formerly of Carnegie and now at the University of Siena in Italy, and Carnegie’s Ken Caldeira, estimated the greenhouse gas emissions related to livestock in 237 countries over a nearly half a century and found that livestock emissions increased by 51 percent over this period.”
Beyond my questioning the climate alarmism involved here regarding livestock digestive emissions, I somehow have a hard time understanding where they counted 237 countries in the world. The link below states that there are only 193 member nations in the U.N. and the U.S. recognizes the existence of 195. If they can’t get their country count right, what else do they get wrong?
http://geography.about.com/cs/countries/a/numbercountries.htm.
The evolution in the size of the human brain is credited to meat eating and early human teeth were designed to eat meat. So it is natural for humans to eat meat. The real problem was the change from being hunter gatherers to becoming farmers and ranchers where survival of the fittest no longer applied. This resulted in the passing on of genetic material that is less than top of the line. Anyone with any kind of physical malady wouldn’t have survived as a hunter gatherer, including me because I am nearsighted. So let’s count our blessings for having a society where the genetically weaker can still thrive and enjoy life. I think I will go out now to grill a huge porterhouse steak and eat it off the bone with my bare hands. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!
And the fact that human population growth thus their farts has nothing to do with a calculated rise in methane?
But let’s leave that aside for a moment. Hey folks, I’ve been to a vegetarian food only retreat hot springs. Trust me, the sulfur from the wonderful medicinal waters is a drop in the bucket compared to what happens after eating veggie meals. So much so that if it weren’t for the geothermal energy available as a heating source, the retreat center cabins could burn methane instead.
I call this piece of crap research…crap. As well as another example of grant chasing.
M Courtney says:
July 21, 2014 at 12:57 pm
I should have known as soon as I said something hasn’t been linked to climate change someone would prove me wrong.
No, I’m in the US and the illegal immigration I referred to is occurring over our border with Mexico, consisting mostly of minors transiting through Mexico from Central America. Has anyone mentioned climate change as the reason illegal immigrants are getting younger? Must be; it certainly couldn’t be because our twice-elected coyote-in-chief has unilaterally changed immigration law to exempt “children” from deportation.
If someone in the US leaves a minor child unaccompanied in a hot car for 10 minutes to go into a store he/she is likely to be cited for neglect/endangerment. But our President can encourage over 30,000 parents so far this year to put their children into the hands of professional smugglers to make the journey from Central America to the US border while crossing hostile desert and trying to evade the border patrol, and he has the chutzpah to claim this “crisis” only proves the need for the “comprehensive immigration reform” he has so far been unable to ram through Congress.
Sorry; this is way O/T. Rant over.
Pastureland sequesters 0.3 tons of Carbon per acre per year on average (some higher, some lower). Each section of pastureland sequesters about 1000 tons of CO2equivalent per year.
This sequestration rate is 6 times higher than equivalent methane emissions from cattle on that same pastureland.
Cows emit 2.3 tons of methane in CO2equivalent per year. Assuming 10 acres per cow, those 64 cattle on a section would only emit 147 tons of CO2e per year
Proof in a picture here. There is a lot of CO2equivalent cattle in those 12 inches of black Carbon-rich soil.
http://esask.uregina.ca/management/app/assets/img/enc2/selectedbig/51F187F4-1560-95DA-43DFADB7FF2FC811.jpg
The computer model obviously left human flatulence out of the calculations. Humans are omnivores, not vegetarians. Our teeth and our guts aren’t made to process large amounts of vegetable matter. (Compare yourself with a cow or a deer if you need more information on this). All that indigestible vegetable matter gets passed along to our little friends in our intestines (the bacteria which live in our guts) and our little friends do what they do. The results — increased gastro-intestinal emissions — from both ends of our alimentary canals.
And don’t get me started on how all that extra fiber will put a strain on our sewer systems.
Alan Watt, Climate Denialist Level 7 says at July 21, 2014 at 2:15 pm…
Sorry, I make a policy of not talking about the internal politics of foreign countries. It’s your country, you work it out.
It’s also way off topic.
But in the UK I’m all for the dynamic, determined immigrants fighting their way in to my country. I’d just like to deport the slackers in exchange.
However, I am a left-winger so I doubt we will agree politically on much – Yet maybe we can agree that linking unrelated, PC bollocks just to add momentum to an “agenda push” is a devious dodging of debate. Which is cowardly.
Anti-Carbon = Anti-Life
krischel says:
July 21, 2014 at 12:53 pm
They bury the lede – you can’t just top eating livestock, you need to kill all the livestock you have. It’s their *life* that is the problem, not their death.
Taken a step further, this is an argument that wiping out species reduces global warming.
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We could start with the Greens
This statistic concerns me much more than the number of cow farts.
“Considering all factors in beef cattle production including direct consumption, irrigation of pastures and crops, and carcass processing, it takes 435 gallons of water to produce a pound of boneless beef, according to the CAST 1999 Animal Agriculture and Global Food Supply Report”
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CB8QFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.beef.org%2FuDocs%2FFactoid%2520Fighter%2520Revisions%252011-03-03.doc&ei=JITNU738I6np8AHlooD4Ag&usg=AFQjCNHgxyGg-7khGuJ6sOgBE29C6760Ow&bvm=bv.71198958,d.b2U&cad=rja
How will Lord Stern cope without his Chateaubriand steak?
Oops, sorry, forgot, he won’t have to.