From IOP PUBLISHING and the “our way or the highway” department:
Global diet and farming methods ‘must change for environment’s sake’
Reducing meat consumption and using more efficient farming methods globally are essential to stave off irreversible damage to the environmental, a new study says.
The research, from the University of Minnesota, also found that future increases in agricultural sustainability are likely to be driven by dietary shifts and increases in efficiency, rather than changes between food production systems.
Researchers examined more than 740 production systems for more than 90 different types of food, to understand the links between diets, agricultural production practices and environmental degradation. Their results are published today in the journal Environmental Research Letters.
Lead author Dr Michael Clark said: “If we want to reduce the environmental impact of agriculture, but still provide a secure food supply for a growing global population, it is essential to understand how these things are linked.”
Using life cycle assessments – which detail the input, output and environmental impact of a food production system – the researchers analysed the comparative environmental impacts of different food production systems (e.g. conventional versus organic; grain-fed versus grass-fed beef; trawling versus non-trawling fisheries; and greenhouse-grown versus open-field produce), different agricultural input efficiencies (such as feed and fertilizer), and different foods.
The impacts they studied covered levels of land use, greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs), fossil fuel energy use, eutrophication (nutrient runoff) and acidification potential.
Dr Clark said: “Although high agricultural efficiency consistently correlated with lower environmental impacts, the detailed picture we found was extremely mixed. While organic systems used less energy, they had higher land use, did not offer benefits in GHGs, and tended to have higher eutrophication and acidification potential per unit of food produced. Grass-fed beef, meanwhile, tended to require more land and emit more GHGs than grain-fed beef.”
However, the authors note that these findings do not imply conventional practices are sustainable. Instead, they suggest that combining the benefits of different production systems, for example organic’s reduced reliance on chemicals with the high yields of conventional systems, would result in a more sustainable agricultural system.
Dr Clark said: “Interestingly, we also found that a shift away from ruminant meats like beef – which have impacts three to 10 times greater than other animal-based foods – towards nutritionally similar foods like pork, poultry or fish would have significant benefits, both for the environment and for human health.
“Larger dietary shifts, such as global adoption of low-meat or vegetarian diets, would offer even larger benefits to environmental sustainability and human health.”
Co-author Professor David Tilman said: “It’s essential we take action through policy and education to increase public adoption of low-impact and healthy foods, as well the adoption of low impact, high efficiency agricultural production systems.
“A lack of action would result in massive increases in agriculture’s environmental impacts including the clearing of 200 to 1000 million hectares of land for agricultural use, an approximately three-fold increase in fertilizer and pesticide applications, an 80 per cent increase in agricultural GHG emissions and a rapid rise in the prevalence of diet-related diseases such as obesity and diabetes.
Professor Tilman added: “The steps we have outlined, if adopted individually, offer large environmental benefits. Simultaneous adoption of these and other solutions, however, could prevent any increase in agriculture’s environmental impacts. We must make serious choices, before agricultural activities cause substantial, and potentially irreversible, environmental damage.”
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Our diets WILL change — we must take control over our food sovereignty NOW, before these control freaks try to dictate any further, and before the Grand Solar Minimum intensifies!
iceagefarmer.com
So if Beef requires greater agricultural space for food to feed the cattle (grazing land), How much more agricultural space would be needed for farming if everyone DID go VEGAN
Let’s back up and try to understand the land use claim for cattle itself. I don’t know about you, but I’m having a hard time following their logic here, that cattle on pasture land equates to land use change, i.e. converting grassland to cropland or building a parking lot.
What was the land before cattle? Grassland that sustained many animals, including millions of bovine. Now, the grassland is used to sustain millions of …bovine, and last I checked there were still the full range of biodiversity in grasslands save for a few apex predator species (which we’ve replaced).
How exactly has the grassland changed if it is still being used exactly what it was used for in the past? I know herbicidal control has altered pasture land, but this is now being more properly managed than ever before. This is the same sophistry that led to the culling of thousands of elephants in Africa, except this time it is homo sapiens being targeted for culling.
My wild ass guess is that any remaining grassland is not viable as crop land.
A long time ago I was visiting a buddy in southwest Saskatchewan. I got the impression that the ranches were greater than ten square miles each. Buddy pointed out that in the early 1900s, the land was settled by farmers; each farm about a quarter of a square mile. You sure wouldn’t know it by looking around. The land is completely reverted to grassland.
University of Minnesota,…anyone else notice this?
Minnesota is in the top 10 for beef production with over 2.5 million beef cattle
The raionale is that land that can grow grass to feed beef can grow vegetables that contain more nourishment per acre than the beef.
In some ways this is absolutely true IF the land is suitable for arable usage.
In many parts of the world upland pastures are not suitable for arable, and sheep and goats turn it into something of value. Or tundra. Reindeer graze on inedible lichens. Or grasslands. Cattle and other edible ruminants can eat it. Humans cant. Even pigs and poultry are forest floor dwellers that eat stuff we cant or dont, making handy protein packs in the process.
What the vegans are on about is intensive factory farming, where you can feed more people off intensive factory farmed beansprouts and soyburgers than you can off cattle.
That however does not apply to large tracts of the earth’s surface and certainly not to ‘sustainable’ farming …
Then there is the sea…should we eat the plankton and starve the whales, or eat the whales…
In the Little Green Mind its all so simple.
Its just very complicated in real life, which is why the simple story goes down better.
Robert, the land may well have been tropical forest…
Also in the US beef is more likely to get soy/grain feed than in other parts of the world… land use elsewhere may have gone to GM soy production to feed US beef… over 90 million acres of the US grow corn for animal feed.
Looking at the lush growth of a tropical forest, it’s easy to conclude that the soil must be really good. In fact, the opposite is true. link
I noticed that Griff just had to throw in that swipe against GM food.
Regardless, most food in the US is wasted on pests or not being refrigerated. Or wasted to produce ethanol for our cars. We don’t have a food production problem – we have a food distribution and regulation problem.
Once again, giffiepoo stretches the bounds of ignorance and arrogance. Especially since he has been educated on the true facts before. His brain is purest osmium, failing to retain truth and reality.
“may well have been tropical”; absolutely specious giffiepoo! Throwing in an imaginary strawman distraction.
Bogus argument.
“U.S. beef is more likely to get soy/grain”; another totally specious claim. Back your specious strawman claim up with facts wacko! And not from loon sites, but from actual beef production official metrics!
“land use elsewhere may have gone to GM soy production to feed US beef”; again a totally imaginary strawman distraction spread as manure without and instead of facts.
giffiepoo alleges USA soybean import, when America is the largest producer and exporter of soybean; exporting the majority of every soybean crop.
giffiepoo turns off his brains first, before checking any thing factual for the real numbers.
“over 90 million acres of the US grow corn for animal feed”. Pure arrogance!
giffiepoo has just stated that the entire USA corn planting is targeted for animal feed; meaning us Americans and the countries we export corn to as food are all animals.
90 million acres of corn is roughly the average total corn planted per year since 2010:
Acres____Corn____Corn
Year____Planted__Harvested
2010/11 88.19 81.45
2011/12 91.94 83.88
2012/13 97.29 87.37
2013/14 95.37 87.45
2014/15 90.60 83.14
2015/16 88.00 80.75
2016/17 94.15 86.55
A significant percentage is not harvested, but left to feed wildlife.
Corn harvested fresh, may, depending on the farmer use the corn stalks for animal feed. The fresh corn is all aimed at human food.
Corn harvested dry, the corn stalks are usually left in the field to be tilled under for soil improvement.
Dry corn is not good feed for ruminants. It is high calorie dense food that ferments excessively in ruminant stomachs and intestines.
Fresh corn stalks are good fodder for ruminants and pigs.
The vast majority of corn used as “animal feed” is used for chickens and turkeys. Corn meal finds it’s way into many pet food products and even aquaculture.
This is before admitting the fact that if farmers could raise cash crops on land, instead of beef; they would. One can not raise enough beef per acre to equal what can be earned raising corn, soy and wheat.
Drive across the Midwest and West checking the land where cattle are raised.
None of that beef occupied land is arable land without significant:
rock removal,
irrigation,
soil amendment,
fertilization, etc.
Instead the cattle, sheep, goats, whatever thrive on the roughage they do get to eat, where crops are extremely difficult to raise.
The East is similar, just lusher. Cattle and other ruminants are raised where raising crops is not possible.
giffiepoo is baldly lying through his fangs! It begs the question(s); after spewing so many falsehoods so frequently, how such a pathetic trollop dares to admit their presence.
By this quick review of USDA regarding corn harvests, by my estimation giffiepoo should never eat red meat, pork, chicken, turkey, tilapia, salmon, trout, carp, catfish and perhaps many more meat sources.
Something, we have zero faith in; giffiepoo is simply a falsehood fount. What a waste of humankind.
Like giffiepoo, Dr Michael Clark comes across another ignorant activist making proclamation based on pay and faith, not observations, science, facts or truth. Instead it is lie after lie.
And don’t forget USG mandated ethanol from corn. A good bit of America’s corn harvest is used in that.
“Once again, giffiepoo stretches the bounds of ignorance and arrogance. Especially since he has been educated on the true facts before.”
You can inform the Grifter of the facts – complete with chapter, verse, numbers and links to peer-reviewed papers a thousand times, it will make no difference whatsoever, he will continue to post lies.
He posts what he’s paid to post by his paymasters in the ‘Unreliables’ industry, nothing more, nothing less, and he has absolutely zero interest in the veracity of his posts.
2hotel9 and catweazle666; absolutely! I am in full agreement with both of you!
Cattle have four stomachs, and teeth which wear out, unless caped with a metal tooth. Their feed is prepared in one of them for digestion in one of them, enabling them to convert grass & grains to energy which determine their ratio of fat, meat, milk or bone.
Thus, areas where only grass grows will seldom have cattle ready to be slaughtered, or used to produce milk for consumption. Certain areas grow feeds which are not normlly consumed by people, but can be fed to cattle, as in the Texas Panhandle, which had only three or four feedlots until Wheatheart Feeders, Inc. began with 24,500 cattle on feed, later expanded to 65,000. It was expanded to hold 60,000 cattle, with subsidiary lots in Oklahoma and the state of Washington. Total capacity of 108,000. When the President froze beef prices, it collapsed, while we were preparing to expand. Now I am told the Panhandle is one of the largest cattle feeding area in the nation, and they do not have far to go to find cattle to feed. And the slaughter house followed with the ability to send beef to either coast.
Cattle are brought to the feedlots, from nearby ranches in New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, and of course, Texas to feedlots similar to the one described, and with a very large radius of Amarillo, produce tons of beef daily for nearby killing plants.
Grass and grain supply food, that otherwise would not be normally be consumed.
WilliMc.
Grass-fed beef? Make my beef grain-fed. I like the kind of beef that is produced by steers fattened up on half-fermented silage. Don’t let those steers walk around all over the place grazing on grass, burning calories and making lean, tough muscle for me to chew in my steaks. Give me beef from bovines who spend their days confined to feed lots getting juicy and fat. I’ll buy it and eat it as long as I can. Let the dang markets sort out what we can afford and what we can’t.
If you believe cattle moseying around in small paddocks makes their meat tough and stringy, check out Joel Salatin and his practices on Polyface Farms in Virginia. Five times the county average cow-days/acre, soil remediation etc. He calls his product salad bar beef. His 5000+ direct purchase customers for beef, chicken, turkey, rabbit, and many other value added farm products seem to think he is on to something.
He claims that using methods like his just on the acreage in the US wasted on lawns and horse pasture could completely replace the existing US agricultural food production and heal the land in the process.
Search Youtube for Joel Salatin.
Horses are good to eat, too.
“If wishes was horses we would all be eating steak!” Jayne Cobb.
The usual nonsense. I’ve written about this before at WUWT.
Regards to all,
w.
Animal, Vegetable, or E. O. Wilson 2010-09-11
Buoyed by the equal parts of derision and support I received for writing in “I am So Tired Of Malthus” about how humans are better fed than at any time in history, I am foolishly but bravely venturing once again into the question of how we feed ourselves. In a…
Vegans are not from Vegas 2010-10-20
In response to my recent post about whether we could feed more people if everyone were vegetarians (I say no), a poster named Marissa wrote a heartfelt paean to Veganism. Figure 1. Perhaps the world’s best-known adherent of a strict Vegan diet. Vegans are a kind of fundamentalist sect of born-again…
Agreed, this is more lifestyle moralising dressed up a science.
“Cladding for Grenfell Tower was cheaper, more flammable option”
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/16/manufacturer-of-cladding-on-grenfell-tower-identified-as-omnis-exteriors
As I said as soon as I saw the sheets of flame licking up the side of that building the main cause of the disaster was the external thermal insulation, installed in 2016. I thought it would have been fire “resistant” foam but it’s worse than that. I was not even fire resistant.
Apparently UK building regs do not even require fire resistant materials. It is fine to put flammable plastic foam all over the outside of the high rise.
I emailed the Guardian suggesting that they look into it and it appears that they did.
The AGW madness is now killing people. The “carbon footprints” are now those of the families tragically burned alive in a pathetic attempt to reduce “carbon emissions”. Well kudos UK govt. , how much “carbon” did you save with this one.
I hope that Building Regulations dealing with heat loss will be quickly amended so that such cladding can be removed from all tower blocks, that would put the Planet Savers between a rock and a hard place, where many of them belong.
That gives an idea of how many other death traps have been created by this insanity.
In France, any renovation work on building facades, even older traditional stone construction now have to be fitted with external insulation cladding.
I don’t know the details of what materials are permitted.
IIRC, there are 10,000 similarly clad buildings in the UK. Maybe the cost of installing and then removing the flammable cladding could be charged to the green climate fund, or to whatever green organizations had a hidden (so far) hand in this tunnel-vision project.
The replacement cladding should be asbestos, to stick a thumb in their eye.
Greg,
If their statement of “You know that you are in good hands” were ture, it would only be because you had Allstate Fire Insurance
“I thought it would have been fire “resistant” foam but it’s worse than that. I was not even fire resistant.”
Possibly because the non-resistant foam is a better insullator.
climanrecon
I posted on Paul Homewood’s ‘Not a lot of people know that’ the other day describing the well known effects of cladding old buildings with modern materials.
By way of example, my daughter and I were looking at student accommodation for her this week. We viewed two modern buildings with double glazing and central heating designed and installed when the buildings were erected. No problem, nice buildings but more importantly, well ventilated, healthy buildings.
We inspected three Victorian buildings and the stench of dampness upon walking in the door was overpowering. All fireplaces were, of course absent, a vital source of ventilation for these buildings, and the doors and windows were double glazed. The frequently painted over damp patches caused by condensation and poor ventilation were clearly evident. They were building of a time which do not respond well to modern concepts of energy saving or environmentalism. However, with the addition of modern mechanical ventilation, which of course can include heat recovery, they would have been immeasurably better, but building regulations don’t bother their arse with common sense details like that.
Grenfell Tower is the high rise equivalent of the ‘cavity wall insulation’ and ‘double glazing’ frenzy of the last 30 years. Aged buildings, often past their functional life, brought up to ‘modern’ standards by additional materials. The practical consequences of these bizarre and irresponsible actions are usurped by the theoretical, spreadsheet driven efficiencies, ignoring the well documented downsides of dampness, fungal intrusion and consequent ill health.
And whilst diesel emissions are cited as exacerbating chronic respiratory conditions, the wholesale conversion of old London buildings with double glazing and now ‘efficient’ log burners are likely to cause the conditions in the first place. But will that ever be be broadcast by our ignorant media? Despite Grenfell Tower, the focus of attention will at all costs avoid any finger of blame being pointed at our collective, insane focus on energy efficiency.
We have all been suckered by the green blob at one point in our lives. In fact, at one point, we were all, unwittingly, likely part of the green blob, I certainly was.
And if anyone has the financial wherewithal, to design and promote a simple, efficient, economical means of whole house ventilation of old Victorian buildings in England, they would make a financial killing, based on the health benefits alone. Particularly if it was supported by government legislation to address the cause of respiratory ill health, rather than simply point the finger at diesel, for example, which is a secondary irritant.
Sorry, a rant, but I’m so pissed off with governments plastering over cracks instead of dealing with the underlying issues.
Question for Paris Accord expert:
Is “de-cladding” an activity that monies from the USA would have been used for if the USA had been stupid enough to remain in the Paris Accord?
Question for London mayor who can’t protect against terrorism either:
Are there no adults that work in the London building code & inspection department?
“Sorry, a rant, but I’m so pissed off with governments plastering over cracks instead of dealing with the underlying issues.”
But that is what government does. Governments are not there to help you, they are there to control you. There is nothing so dangerous as a bureaucrat making rules and regulations for you to follow. (all in your “best interest” of course)
“The only thing that saves us from the bureaucracy is its inefficiency.” — Eugene McCarthy
And then the computer was invented, and now the only thing saving us from the bureaucracy is our fight against it. Keep up the good fight.
Greg says, ” thought it would have been fire “resistant” foam but it’s worse than that. I was not even fire resistant. Apparently UK building regs do not even require fire resistant materials. It is fine to put flammable plastic foam all over the outside of the high rise.”
The Baby Boomers began a decades-long war on inexpensive, effective chemical fire retardants and transformer oils. Not only have the Boomers failed to even admit to themselves that their ongoing environmentalist war on fire retardants was never called off, they are surprised to learn that banning fire retardants causes much damage to property, increase of expenses, and loss of life.
Zeke …
Zeke … I would appreciate it if you didn’t lump ALL ‘Baby Boomers’ together into a single entity and then blame us for all the perceived ills of the world. I can assure that I, for one, conducted no such war on fire retardants. I’m getting sick and tired of all the bigotry … WUWT is one of the few places on the internet where I can get away from it … usually. Please … cease and desist.
@TeaPartyGeezer,
I am referring to the fact that the original transformer oil that was banned by the Boomers was called PCBs.
It is very difficult to find the dissenting scientific opinions, but I believe a strong case can be presented that the banning of PCBs resulted in a very sad and unnecessary increase in electrical fires.
Fire retardants were also affected by the ozone/CFCs environmental scare. The Cannabis Generation may remember that episode in environmentalist ardor? And fire retardants/transformer oils receive constant over-regulation by the GHG scientific fad, and are continuing targets of ban-and-replace environmental activism (and cash-ins by foreign investors and politicians).
There is a history to the war on transformer oils and fire retardants. Inexpensive, benign, and harmless transformer oils are necessary for everything we do because we deal with AC currents and many people live in cities. It all started with harmless PCBs.
Zeke …
Way to ignore the entire meaning of my comment … which was about your bigotry, not about fire retardants. Find another scapegoat. How about narrowing it down to misinformed envirowackos … instead of every human born with a 20 year period. JACKASS.
Not quite teapartygeezer. Just a person who has kept an eye on the cost we all pay when people believe false scientific theories. And it is pretty high.
I think, by your response, you now remember PCBs.
Zeke … I’m not arguing with anything you say … EXCEPT for who you keep blaming. You blame me, my sister, friends I went to school with, the millions of people born in the 40s, 50s, and 60s … only a few of which had anything to do with your pet peeve. Time to grow up and learn to direct your anger at more appropriate targets.
The reason I am committed to pointing out the horrible consequences of the myriad pet philosophies of the Boomer generation is twofold. One, because I (and society) am paying a high price personally, and two, because they still have more grand social experiments they want to carry out. With no shame, and with no acknowledgment of their own utter fallibility and destructive current results.
Karl Popper once said that intellectual revolutionaries rarely get good results, or even the results they expected. I am here to help connect what the Counter Culture wanted with what we got. It is plain that the failure of their beloved theories and paradigms are going to go unremarked unless I say something.
I am taking it from your response that you remember banning PCBs and CFCs? Any body? Hello?
Zeke … yes, I vaguely remember the hoopla re. PCBs and CFCs. It was all around the same time as the global cooling scare. But I wasn’t involved in it … I was working 60 hours a week in a grocery bag factory. The ‘coming ice age’ was all over the news and scared the crap outta me … and as I recall, PCBs were supposed to cause cancer (what doesn’t?), and CFCs caused something called the ozone hole. Other than that, I was clueless. I was born in 1945 and had nothing to do with banning any damn thing.
Please, God, save me from self-important people who want to save the world from imaginary climate crises … and the ‘horrible consequences’ of the evil deeds someone imagines I committed.
The worst thing is that we’re actually paying people to feed us Bullsh_it in this climate change funding. It isn’t going to stop until we cut off the funding.
Roger Knights, “The replacement cladding should be asbestos”.
As a younger person I took delight in throwing broken pieces of asbestos in open fires, It goes of with a bang. Maybe moisture in the fibres.
It was a cyanurate foam. Guess what that breaks down into when it is heated?
Re: Chip Javert’s Q: Is “de-cladding” an activity that monies from the USA would have been used for if the USA had been stupid enough to remain in the Paris Accord?
Almost certainly not.
Cladding, as Greg above points out above at 11:45am, is done to reduce human CO2 emissions (of buildings). More cladding would be the likely expenditure per the Paris Sc@m.
See, e.g.,
(Source: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360544209005155 )
Thus:
to the extent that the cladding caused the fire to be as deadly as it was,
those people died
because of a completely IMAGINARY problem.
ALL of the scientists who have ever promoted AGW have blood on their hands.
Not blood Janice. More like carbonised bodies. How ironic is that?
markstoval:
You write
Please try to think what you are saying before posting such self-contradictory nonsense.
The government exists to “help” its electorate, and the electorate sacks the government in a General Election following the government failing to ‘help’ them. Part of that ‘help’ consists of the government deciding and enforcing appropriate building regulations. In the case of the Grenfell Tower disaster the government has failed to do that. Clearly, the failure was to not appoint and/or control appropriate bureaucrats to make rules and regulations for builders to follow.
The Grenfell Tower disaster would not have been a government failure for which the government has to answer if the government existed to “control you” INSTEAD OF “helping you” then . Of course, the ‘help’ requires some control to ensure that regulations are fulfilled, but that is a necessary part of the ‘help’.
It seems you are confusing government with the behaviour of criminal gangsters. In reality, the existence of such criminals is merely an example of government failure to ‘help’ its electorate by controlling the criminals. Of course,if you are in the employ of a mobster such as Al Capone then you would be right in thinking that “Governments are not there to help you, they are there to control you”. The rest of us want government to ‘help’ us by protecting us from the behaviours of libertarians such as Al Capone.
Richard
Why did we get on this topic when the article is about agriculture and land use? Mods you are being too liberal to allow this diversion IMHO. But here goes—- it is more cost effective to insulate the inside of a building and cover it with coded drywall 5/8″ used in the USA for a one hour fire rating. Additionally, most heat loss in high rise buildings is through the fenestration ( glass ) not the wall, and in residential– through the roof. The next biggest heat loss is through infiltration ( crack and entry/exit ) and/or make-up air ventilation. We now manufacture glass with an R-7 insulation value which I retrofitted a rental I use to own–effective.
My home a timber-frame, has a SIP ( structural insulated panel ) envelope walls and roof and the major addition the walls are reinforced concrete poured into Styrofoam forms which remain after the pour and then covered with epoxy stucco which cannot sustain a flame. Roof R-33 Walls R-30. My roof is SIPS —covered by a standing seam metal roof system— since I live near woods.
And yes I spent 50 years in the energy business and was a missionary in the 80s on conservation when nobody was listening—did I say my homes have been geothermal HVAC equipped?
Oh geez, every business decision is a trade-off. YA THINK? Maybe that’s news to the millennials educated beyond their intelligence, who are just getting the word that chocolate milk doesn’t come from brown cows, and meat doesn’t majickally arrive at the shrink-wrapped and bar-coded state in which they buy it; but I think most of us living in the REAL WORLD figured it out a while ago.
“Vegans” are less than 2% of the population; and most last on the diet for less than a year. I’m convinced that the widespread epidemic of STUPIDITY worldwide has lots to do with soy baby formula, no-fat milk for school-age children, “soy lattes,” etc. Flooding developing male brains with phytoestrogens may be part of why the sudden outbreak of sexual confusion, etc. as well! We are literally DE-EVOLVING for lack of the very long-chain fatty acids (only obtainable from animal sources) that enabled our brain development to differentiate from that of the great apes. Call me one of the “second-hand vegetarians!” 😉
How odd and so absurdly over the top wrong.
PCBs are still significant causes of pollution and the dangerous ones are still extremely dangerous.
From: http://www.vdh.virginia.gov/environmental-epidemiology/public-health-toxicology/fish-consumption-advisories/shenandoah-river-basin/
“South Fork Shenadoah River downstream from Rt. 619 bridge crossing near Front Royal to the confluence with North Fork Shenandoah River, North Fork Shenandoah River from mouth of the river upstream to Riverton Dam, and Shenandoah River from the confluence of North and South Forks to VA/WV state line. These river segments comprise ~41 miles. (5/17/89; modified, 12/13/04) Warren Co., and Clarke Co. PCBs Carp DO NOT EAT
PCBs Channel Catfish DO NOT EAT
PCBs Sucker Species DO NOT EAT
PCBs Rock Bass No more
than two meals/month
PCBs Sunfish Species
PCBs Smallmouth Bass
PCBs Largemouth Bass”
From: “The ecotoxicology of coplanar polychlorinated biphenyls”
“Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) have been recognized for over 25 years as global environmental contaminants. However, many PCB congeners may be relatively harmless, while a small group of PCB congeners are highly toxic to biota. The toxic coplanar PCB congeners are chlorinated at meta positions and at one or none of the ortho positions on the biphenyl ring, thus resembling 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD) in molecular configuration. In vitro and in vivo toxicity tests with rodents, fish, and birds have shown that the coplanar PCB congener 126 is almost as toxic as TCDD”
Harmless? Another true denier.
@ATheoK inre: Fire retardants, PCBs, CFCs, etc.
The recent fire in London is an appropriate time to reflect on the environmentalist attack on all fire retardants, and the history of bans on fire retardants. The truth is that the European Union is in the process of disallowing fire retardants altogether:
“New Thinking on Flame Retardants”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2367656/
““Instead of adding new fire retardant chemicals that ultimately may be shown to cause health problems, we should be asking whether we need to use these chemicals or if there are other ways to achieve equivalent fire safety,” contends Arlene Blum, a biophysical chemist and visiting scholar at the University of California, Berkeley. “So many of the chemicals we have banned in the past were flame retardants—think about asbestos, polychlorinated biphenyls, polybrominated biphenyls, tris(2,3-dibromopropyl) phosphate, PBDEs—[and] they all ended up in the environment and in people,” she points out. “We need to think carefully about adding these sorts of chemicals to consumer products before there is adequate health information.””
The EU has banned Bromine type biphenyls as well as Chlorine based biphenyls.
Now I am just pointing out that given the environmentalists desire to de-industrialize Europe and the US, it may be a good time to look carefully at the consequences of banning all these useful diphenyls, and to look at the science behind that. Look at their stated motives, and look at the fires that can result. We safely handle AC currents and live in cities, and if fire retardants are banned by the EU, then these are the kinds of consequences we can expect.
PS. I do have an answer for the supposed long-lived concentrations of PCBs, and the ways it is detected, but maybe another time. The fact that even Benzene rings themselves are being declared pollutants by the environmentalists should be a warning that all was not as you were told. Just consider my point for one moment, and that is that a war on benzene, phenols, phenyls and biphenyls would be as ridiculous and costly to society as a war on carbon dioxide. They are naturally occurring and they are everywhere.
Then throw the bums out!
Allowing fad and fashion to dictate laws is bad practice.
I am all in favor of requiring definitive proof before any unique item can be made illegal; not the current irrational rages.
I am reminded of the amanita mushroom family.
Common throughout much of the world and contains some of the deadliest mushrooms known to mankind. Poisonings by certain members of this family result in 50%-80% fatality and the entire poisoning is extremely unpleasant.
Amanitas are easily recognizable as it is the only mushroom family with white gills and white spores.
Some descriptive names are given to truly deadly members;
a) Destroying angel, European Amanita virosa
b) Eastern Destroying angel, America Amanita bisporigera
c) Western Destroying angel, America Amanita ocreata
d) Death cap, European origin now possibly worldwide, Amanita phalloides
e) Panther cap, Amanita pantherina
And the famous fly agaric, Amanita muscaria which has several subspecies; none of which tend to be anywhere near as deadly and the Russian subspecies secondary poison is considered psychedelic.
Yet existing in this family Amanita are several edible and quite choice members; e.g. Amanita caesaria
European Union common practice should make it a crime to eat any Amanita; as only experienced experts can tell the differences between edible and deadly members.
Amanita muscaria:
http://poisonousplants.ansci.cornell.edu/toxicagents/images/amanita2mus_s.jpg
Ceasar’s Amanita, Amanita caesarea: Edible (highly prized in Europe)
“Found in northern Africa and southern Europe. In North America it is found in Arizona and New Mexico as well as in Mexico and Central America. There are a few very closely related species found in the eastern United States (The American Ceasar’s Mushroom, Amanita jacksonii is a common one)”
http://tcpermaculture.com/site/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/A_caesarea.jpg
I agree with the notion that banning useful products on hearsay and innuendo is extremely wrong.
I do not agree that lumping entire categories as evil, bad or beneficial in toto.
Well, maybe except for ban all the lawyers and politicians.
I’ll believe we’re running short on food and land for consumption crops once I see:
– The US Government stops paying farmers to let land go fallow
– Homes have to be displaced to make room for consumption based crops
– Yields per acre taper off
– GM crops grow in the Red Desert of Wyoming or other similarly harsh environment
Just because cows eat grass, doesn’t mean that particular area is suitable for a vegetable or other food based crop.
Heck, with removing houses, what about everyone having a vegetable garden in the back yard?
Heck even apartment dwellers could replace the flower box with a vegetable box.
We are very far from running out of land to grow stuff in.
There is plenty of available land in the US to grow stuff in/on, but there might be a shortage of water in a few locales, ……. whereas the dire fact is that we are quickly running out of competent citizens that are capable of planting and caring for a “growing” food source, be it in a flower box, a flower bed, a vacant lot or an often used garden spot. And “wacky tabacca” is not considered a “food source”. And hiring an “illegal immigrant” to grow it for you doesn’t count either.
@Samuel C Cogar Actually the cousin to “Wacky Tabacca”, hemp, creates seeds which are quite nutritious. It’s too bad our government doesn’t seem to understand the difference between hemp and marijuana. There are significant benefits to growing industrial hemp beyond just the nutritional value of hemp seeds.
Hemp seed is 33% protein
Hemp seed is 35% essential fatty acid
(Omega 3, 6, 9 and GLA)
Contains all 9 essential amino acids
Contains 6.2 x more Omega-3 than raw tuna
Contains an abundant source of GLA
Rich in trace minerals
High in dietary fiber
http://www.purehealingfoods.com/hempHeartsAnalysis.php
jgriggs3 June 16, 2017 at 1:13 pm
You are so right about hemp. Thank you for your post, more people should learn the truth especially our old fart elected officials who have outdated, incorrect information about hemp. Hemp is also easy to grow, needs less amounts of water and no insecticides. It is much better to use it as ethanol fuel due to its low moisture content. Florida is considering hemp as a cash crop since conditions here are excellent for growing hemp.
After evaluating hemp food consumption for any incriminating levels of THC in workplace drug screenings in Canada, the levels appear to be sufficiently low enough to prevent confirmed positives from the extended and extensive consumption of hemp foods.
40% of the USA grain crop is turned into biofuel to run automobiles on. A similar thing is happening in Europe, but I don’t have the statistics. Whatever, this does not indicate any shortage of land to grow food. It’s just another symptom of the green insanity that has overtaken the world. There is no shortage of petroleum, and this biofuel probably produces more CO2 than it saves due to the energy required to make it. It entails a lot of boiling of liquids. The end product costs twice as much, and shortens the life of IC engines.
Lots of “Hemp” growing in the ditches in Kansas and Nebraska. Once watched a bunch of kids who didn’t know better filling plastic bags with it not realizing what it was. The locals call it “Ditch Weed”.
http://www.tokeofthetown.com/2011/08/wild_hemp_grows_everywhere_in_nebraska_photos.php/
RE: Once watched a bunch of kids … Wayne Delbeke at 4:20 pm
It has been a long time but I recall this being done in Iowa as student or “scout” projects.
Seems it followed this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemp_for_Victory
i read that cali that ultragreentard state has now banned anyone growing a vegie garden if they werent already doing so prior to the new regs enacting banning them
anyone got confirmation?
No. But now that it’s been mentioned they probably will.
Yeah, but – even with land, not everyone can successfully grow edible stuff. When we moved from a flat to a house, I reserved a corner of the garden for a vegetable plot. The local wildlife must have said “Goodie! Free food!” and the only time I had ANY success was when I liberally sprayed bushes and netted the salad stuff. That, of course, meant that ‘garden fresh’ veggies ended up costing 2-3 times as much as supermarket. This, of course, is why civilisations now have commercial farmers, rather than lots of peasants.
RHS
Our Red Desert environment much more hospitable than any large city. See how much food you can grow in those concrete jungles. Plus, other than a few mountain lions and rattlesnakes, the inhabitants are much more hospitable as well (excluding a few mother cows who might take you if you get too close to their calves).
I should have stated something to the effect of more hospitable to a vegetable crop. Personally I’ve seen lots of signs of life in the Red Desert. There are tons of grass eating critters and critters which eat the grass eaters. Between being a high desert plateau, minimal rain fall, even the sage brush seldomly grows to more than a couple of feet high because of the constant wind.
I can’t imagine the irrigation supply which would have to be run or the wind breaks needed to get some asparagus or raspberries to grow there.
RHS
I’ll take issue on one of your points:
The US Government stops paying farmers to let land go fallow”
“Fallow land is left to rest for a good purpose, to allow it to recover from the last crop it produced. I believe it’s no barely necessary with modern fertilizers.
I think what you’re referring to is abandoned land. And that’s a crime.
Or maybe he means “conservation land” which is left fallow. However, ethanol kind of did that in—planting virgin prairie in corn paid more than the government did to leave it be. I would imagine the 5000+ wind turbines in Iowa used some of it up also. Not sure about other states, but putting in a 5 figure rental turbine has to be more lucrative than farming or conservation. Worked in Wyoming, too. Complete landscape changes for energy from weather, but don’t you dare raise a cow.
Sheri,
There is a scandal in Northern Ireland right now where millions of £UK taxpayer money was wasted on an ‘environmental’ scheme that encouraged people to buy wood pellets and burn them as fuel.
The problem is, it was so badly thought through that people were shovelling wood pellets into furnaces to heat empty buildings and even barns. The more they burned, the more they earned.
It is a complete political, financial and social disaster, promoted by (guess who?) the utterly incompetent, meddling, green blob.
I don’t know if it was ever done in the US but in the European Union there was a scheme called “set aside land” where farmers were paid not to produce.
http://www.ecifm.rdg.ac.uk/setaside.htm
It was formerly done in the US, but stopped about 30 odd years ago.
Bad memory, it was until 1996.
John in NZ
It’s well known here, and vociferously objected to. Invariable it’s the wealthy industrial farmers who benefit from the practise, not smaller farmers who suffer because f it.
http://www.heritage.org/agriculture/report/the-cost-americas-farm-subsidy-binge-average-1-million-farm
I’ve worked farm labor for over 20 years of my younger life and had to disc fallow fields to keep the weeds from growing on them, to meet the regulations of getting the subsidies. Farmers will pick the worst land they have that is mostly sandy or has large limestone deposits or harder to water as the fallow land they get paid to not farm.
modern weedliller/chem farming allows continou use
wether thats wise or not is a moot point, fallowing to me is wise thing resting the soils biota
as for the chap above and his support of PCB use?
well finding it IN babies blood and pest etc seems to suggest safer products should be used
Boron seems to be one of the better ones for many purposes
why the hell they “insulate” exteriors”?? nsulate inner walls n cielings by all means
glass fibre or other stuff, annoyingly itchy but it works
ozspeaksup
The alternative to commercial fertilisers and pesticides are frequently “organic” pesticides. They are, I understand, largely untested, at least as toxic to humans as regulated commercial alternatives, and entirely unregulated.
Modern commercial pesticides are well researched and targeted at specific pests. Not perfect of course, but better tha primitive alternatives.
Neonaticides, for example, contrary to popular opinion, do little harm to bee’s as the pesticide itself resides in the plant and inconsequential amounts are transferred to pollen or nectar. Bee’s/butterfly’s/humming birds etc. etc. don’t eat plants.
Sprayed insecticides, organic or otherwise, are indiscriminate and kill everything in their path. They also contaminate other environments as wind-borne pollution, including human and animal.
If you’re worried about how much grass a cow eats, you’ll really be upset about elephants. Are we going to get rid of them, too?
Javert Chip
Ivory poachers are doing their best.
grain fed enclosed and prone to illness misery n disease is preferred by the greenbiased?
grain feeding is insane. and costly.
+100!
Here is a novel idea. Trust in the invisible hand of the free market. It works pretty good to match supply and demand, to meet people’s desires and needs, and best of all it doesn’t require self-appointed elitists at the Univeristy of Minnesota.
But, but, but, … you aren’t icnluding the true cost of the food in the prices charged at the supermarket – what about the cost of Carbon?
That’s right, Marty. We live in a world that asks us to believe that farmers don’t know how to farm, ranchers do not know how to ranch, and eaters don’t know how to eat. Who knows these things? University professors and Washington bureaucrats. .
A good farmer in Missouri would make no assumptions that he would be just as good growing Oranges in Florida or avocados in California. Yet bureaucrats and professors act like they know everything about everything when making proclamations about how things should be done. In reality, their pronouncements are worthless at the very best. Usually, they do far more harm than good. The free market is millions of people making millions of decisions based on the latest and most detailed information. No centralized authority or ivory tower can come close to competing with the wisdom, efficiency and flexibility of the free market.
Finally, much of the report seems to be a reaction to the threat of global warming, which is not a threat at all. If we reverse the assumption that CO2 is bad into the more reasonable assumption that CO2 is good for the biosphere, this report would be totally different. It would probably go something like this: “Conclusion: Food producers appear to know what they are doing and appear to have the wisdom and ability to feed the planet for countless generations to come. We cannot help but conclude that our work is superfluous, but we will need additional funding to determine if we are COMPLETELY useless!”
jclarke341
Politics. The eternal growth industry, irrespective of the prevailing economic or social conditions.
We need less of these buggers
“That’s right, Marty. We live in a world that asks us to believe that farmers don’t know how to farm, ranchers do not know how to ranch, and eaters don’t know how to eat”
100% on point. Energy experts aren’t the ones to dictate our energy infrastructure, Al Gore and Michael Moore are considered qualified to make those judgements. Anyone with advanced Earth Science degrees that work in the private sector, and got those jobs by outcompeting their government counterparts, is simply a shill that knows nothing, only government employees are authorities in science.
I mean what could go wrong by discrediting anyone in the private sector and handing ALL the decision making to bureaucrats? It’s not like they would release billions of gallons of acidic water into Rocky Mountain watersheds or improperly treat residential drinking supplies and subject thousands of people to high levels of lead, right?
Jclark..
Excellent point , we know how the Communist bureaucrats starved their people with centralized control. It’s clear that the Democrats won’t stop with energy if they win this battle, this article proves there is no satisfying power hungry politicians with their university buddies who never worked a day in their life who think they know everythng with Their computer models
Marty
Just like in the UK with building products. The free market only focuses on profit
No, not “just like …. building products.”
The envirostalinist REGULATIONS are responsible for the homicidal exterior covering materials. In a free housing market, if there is one in the UK, buyers will now refuse to purchase such horrible housing and NON-dangerously-clad rental units will be in demand. Thus, a free market will result in SAFE housing.
ozonebust
The free market exists on trust and reputation. It’s government legislation and law making that invariably causes the problems.
A ‘Limited Company’ is a legal entity by which directors are absolved of all personal responsibility of a company’s behaviour, assuming they have acted ‘legally’. The contractors who installed the cladding on Grenfall Towers went bust. The owner of that company has since set up another cladding company. Not that I believe any of this was his fault, he simply followed instructions from ‘experts’ to clad a building in an energy efficient material.
However, the status of a Limited Company is a legal entity, recognised and accepted, if not promoted by government.
So, set up a Limited Company, draw a huge salary from the work undertaken, in the full knowledge that salary is never at risk, then liquidate the company and throw people into unemployment when things get tough.
Government sponsored racketeering. But most certainly not responsible business practise the vast majority of businessmen conduct.
The Grenfell disaster will require considerable time to conduct a forensic investigation. The UK has extensive building codes and regulations similar to the US and other developed countries. There have been reports that no fire alarms sounded. One report said residents were advised to stay in place. Was the building sprinklered?
The cladding system should have been extensively tested for fire and flame spread resistance. Such testing would include verifying the effectiveness of fire stopping to limit the spread of fire within the wall. It certainly appears that there were multiple failures of systems that should have prevented this disaster. In most cases such failures can be traced back to poor workmanship, corruption and failure to exercise proper oversight and quality control. There will likely be no shortage of people and companies to blame.
HotScot — that is despicable.
Just FYI, in the U.S., in a closely held corporation, the directors/officers CAN and will be held personally liable under a “Piercing the Corporate Veil” or “Disregard of the Corporate Entity” common law cause of action. They are, if they are deemed to have enough control, deemed to be the “alter ego” of the corporation and it is fairly easy to sue them. Whether they have enough assets to pay the plaintiff’s legal fees and award of damages is another question…..
It is difficult to accept that even mildly knowledgable contractors were not aware they were vastly increasing the risk profile of buildings by installing what some/most surely knew were fire hazards (somebody had to have thrown some of this material into a construction-site fire pit and watched what happened).
This is primary reason why big government is bad: even though many people undoubtedly knew this was risky, no one cared enough to correct the rule. And people die.
…and a year from now, nobody will have been punished.
Rick C PE
Even had the sprinklers been working, and one assumes they would have been, they would be totally ineffective as the flames seem to have spread up the outside of the building where there are no sprinklers.
The cladding would have undoubtedly conformed to fire regulations, but no one seems to have considered the chimney effect. From first hand witness accounts, there was a small fire which, when the wind changed direction, escalated within seconds into an inferno.
My simplistic thoughts are that the difference in air pressure between the ground floor and the top floor would only take a slight breeze to create an updraught between the cladding and the original walls thereby encouraging the flames to follow the path of least resistance up the side of the building.
Will heads roll? Perhaps one or two scapegoats, but no one of consequence.
Janice,
“HotScot — that is despicable.”
It is, however, from what you have described of your system, little better. Having to sue someone to recover money is just a lawyers paradise.
However, it is an impossible problem to address now. Too many investors exist as Directors in company’s across the planet. Their financial investment is predicated on immunity from prosecution should it all go belly up. The blame is shifted.
HotScot: Neither you nor I know the details of how the cladding system was designed, installed or whether it complied with code. Engineers, designers and code officials are typically well aware of fire safety issues including the chimney effect. That’s what “fire stopping” is all about. It is typically a non-combustible insulating material (e.g. mineral wool) installed continuously at each floor level. In fact a great deal of building code content is specific to fire safety.
Sprinklers, if they were present and functional, would have likely prevented a great deal of the burning of the building interior and may well have kept the interior and escape routes tenable for evacuation. We can speculate all we want about this tragedy, but we will not know the facts until some real experts (fire safety and forensic engineers) are able to complete a proper investigation.
@Richard Dupuis C PE:
90% of the blame can be laid on the cladding; better alarms & a sprinkler system would have saved more lives, maybe half the lives, but the building would still have been lost. Cluttered hallways and an iffy electrical system didn’t worsen things.
My strong suspition is that the type of foam used was well known to be flammable. One expert Casandra was shouting about it for years. See https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/14/disaster-waiting-to-happen-fire-expert-slams-uk-tower-blocks
See also:
There has been fire-resistant polystyrene for a long time==> I read a construction materials catalog back in the 1980’s by a supplier cautioning that one line was to be used for flotation only as it was not treated to be fire resistant.
@roger Knights
I would think folks here would be a bit cautious about accepting statements from “experts” or articles in the Guardian as fact.
There are four primary types of foam plastic used as insulation board – polystyrene, polyisourethane, ployisocyanurate and phenolic. These vary substantially in their reaction to fire. Some may also contain fire resistant additives. The information I have says that foam used in exterior insulation systems in the UK must achieve a class “O” rating per BS 476 to be used in buildings over 18 meters tall. In many cases use as exterior cladding requires that the foam be fully covered on both surfaces with non-combustible material – eg applied to concrete and covered with cement or gypsum board. If the foam in this case was exposed in a cavity with no covering or firestops I would suspect someone was truly negligent. If a Class O foam was specified and another foam was substituted someone should go to prison.
Everything man does is bad for man. People are the universal problem. We’ve managed to increase our lifespan to the detriment of ourselves. When will we ever learn.
On the other hand, look at it this way.
At the very moment in our planet’s history when falling CO2 from naturally, but accidentally sequestered CO2 represented a threat to all life on our planet, mankind happened along and accidentally discovered how to liberate CO2 back into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels.
I don’t know about you, but I find that the most extraordinary, fortuitous coincidence. In fact were I religious, I would proclaim it a miracle of divine intervention.
I have a suspicion that other habitable worlds in the galaxy have failed to reach the point of CO2 liberation before the sequestering process lowered the CO2 to less than the critical level essential for life. That is why there is no evidence of any other life beyond this third rock.
” I would proclaim it a miracle of divine intervention.”
I have mentioned this before.
IF you are a believer in God almighty, then you must believe that he sequestered all that coal for the benefit of mankind. Not only does it benefit mankind to use COAL, but it also provide the natural CO2 that is required for ALL LIFE ON EARTH.
It is an absolute SIN , NOT to use what the Lord has provided for us. 🙂
On the other hand, perhaps God intended to deprive mankind of the source of life, he sequestered CO2 deliberately and somehow, man prevailed and found fire.
Perhaps there is a divine retribution for murdering his son that mankind is somehow winning? Maybe that’s why the four horsemen of the apocalypse appear daily: “They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine, plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth.” (Revelation 6:7-8).
At this point I will say I looked that up, I’m not religious nor academic. But there are coincidences that could be considered striking, to me at least.
Tom in Florida
with the greatest of respect, yours is a suspicion, mankind’s coincidental occupation of the planet is an evident fact. Except of course, that we might be living in a parallel universe, in which case are we actually here at at all?
And I’ll stop here before the conversation gets too weird.
Pfffft. These academics are pikers when it comes to extreme dieting. Somebody sent me this link this morning …
“A Breatharian mom and dad of two have barely eaten for nine years as they live off “the universe’s energy.”
http://nypost.com/2017/06/15/breatharian-couple-survives-on-the-universes-energy-instead-of-food/
“Larger dietary shifts, such as global adoption of low-meat or vegetarian diets, would offer even larger benefits to environmental sustainability and human health.”
They give themselves away with the above statement and appear to be green-misanthropes. Humans are omnivores and it was the advent of both eating meat and cooked food that have had significant benefits to our species. I enjoy my life at the top of the food chain.
Top of the food chain? The flea and tick beg to differ,
MarkW
I could manage a meal of fleas or ticks if necessary.
Re: “human health”
Bringing up children as vegans is unethical, claims nutritionist.
(Source: http://www.nature.com/news/2005/050221/full/news050221-5.html )
Janice,
Is it any wonder that the veggie munching greens display such extraordinary low intellect?
That is a good point, Mr. Scot. Lol, the cause-effect order is debatable, though…. 🙂
HotScot & Janice
Can we agree it’s congenital with vegans?
Janice:
This is a bit off-topic but is a very recent anecdote concerning “human health” that I think may amuse you.
Yesterday I was informed that the my heart, lung and liver problems may all lose their competition because I now also have malignant prostate cancer. I thought my son, Matthew, was entitled to know this news so yesterday evening I ‘phoned him to tell him.
Upon hearing my news, Matthew replied, “Prostate cancer? That’s a pain in the a$$”.
His superb response gave me the laugh I much needed to cheer me up.
Richard
[From us, from our readers, you have our thoughts and prayers. .mod]
Dear Richard,
First, I am so glad that you were able to laugh at your son’s clever quip. What a gallant fellow you are.
Next, I am so sorry. I don’t know much about that cancer (the man I was married to had a successful prostectomy — DO NOT DO RADIATION — but, his was benign, so, a different situation). There was no bad side effect from that surgery, just a bit of discomfort during a few weeks of recovery. If I’m not mistaken, prostate cancer is very slow growing and most men who get it will die of old age/live out their normal life span. The key, of course, is whether it is Stage 1 – 4. I sure hope yours is less than 4…. If not — even so, God has this — and you, in the palm of his hand.
What a great attitude you have. “My P.S.A. is through the roof, but, at least I’m no longer nearly as concerned about my lung, heart, and liver problems!”
No, that really isn’t funny, but, your noble, chin-up, attitude deserves the honour of applauding it — even though in a sort of backdoor way.
And tomorrow is Father’s Day…..
I already gave you a “card” (and thank you for the acknowledgement in the thread below it). But, here’s one more to say:
I Will Be With You
Jesus, What a Friend for Sinners
Never will I leave you;
never will I forsake you.
Hebrews 13:5.
Finally, Happy Father’s Day, once again, to a dad who gave his son the best gift of all: knowing that he was (and is) loved.
With caring concern and many prayers,
Janice
Underneath are the everlasting arms.
Most of the “benefits” of a vegan diet on the environment depend on the purported malign effect of ruminant flatulence. What, pray tell, about the methane emissions from rice paddies? As changes in GHG levels seem to be very weakly related to climate, so are the “benefits”.
Given the benign:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Their conclusion:
is a nullity.
**************************
And how many organic joints did they smoke to come up with THIS fluff:
??
Seriously, I get that these guys want funding from the enviroprofiteers/stalinists and get a great blessing from being seen as holy by the Church of Sustainability, but…….
don’t they care at all about what their scientist colleagues (the ones not part of the cult, and that is most of them) think of them??
Really? Their study states that meat causes diabetes? Huh, guess I’ll have to switch to snacking on processed sugars instead of meat to prevent it. I’m glad their study brought this to my attention. If I can’t get processed candy, I’ll just much on the vegan friendly sugar cane instead. Then I can get my fiber as well.
Note, all sarcasm is intended for the authors of the study and not those who help me draw the conclusions I want see.
I wonder if the Acidification aspect would even pass the Litmus test
Perhaps the phenolpthalein test (assuming my memories of pH indicators is correct).
Need all that farmland for the wind and solar farms.
… and the growing of bio-fuels.
“Although high agricultural efficiency consistently correlated with lower environmental impacts,”
God bless them ….they discovered the free market
That’s not the free market, that’s efficiency
Free market = competition.
Competition = prices lower.
Prices lower = be efficient in cost of production or be out of business.
Did I really need to explain that to you, ozone?
Or cater to niche markets that are willing to pay higher prices for what you offer. Sometimes the “inefficient” way a product was made is a selling point to the right customer.
A cow eating grass is is no different philosophically than using biomass for fuel. It is GHG neutral according to the Gang green for the latter. Cow eats grass, new growth takes up atmospheric ‘carbon’ and the regrowth is almost instantaneous, far quicker, than the cutting of Carolina hardwoods for the UK’s DraX power. Moreover the beef sequesters most of the carbon and
passes this on to humans who continue sequestering some of it. The sum total of the farts’ carbon is less than that taken up by new growth.
In the case of the vegetarian (all the lies made up by “progressives” notwithstanding), they emit the same gases as the cows from the vegetables they eat. It was a well known downside to being a vegetarian until fake news came along.
Finally, beef is raised on lower quality growing land than for vegetables so is more ‘sustainable’.
Cows also take themselves to water. No need for canals or underground piping to supply water. Therefore, less pressure on other natural resources.
Most beef stock in the USA is fed on corn. That is a problem. The volume of beef recall because of bacteria is significant. Do some research into the USA beef industry, it may influence your decision on eating beef etc again.
Nope. Almost all beef cattle are grass/alfafa fed (ranched) until the last 6 months, then shipped to and fattened in feedlots with a cooked corn/alfalfa mix prior to slaughter. Pork is mostly corn fed.
ozone — that’s 3 strikes on this thread: you’re out.
Do some research.
I asked an Alberta rancher why western beef was so good and eastern beef so poor. He said tell them farmers to finish beef with oats. Corn is used because its cheap and available in the east (east is east of the Prairie provinces) but it makes lousy beef. He said most eastern beef is dairy beef, but it could benefit from oats
Ozone…or….Bust (oh the irony)
Gary, that is mostly correct. Even in Wisconsin, most of the slab beef is dairy steers, and most of the ground beef is from milking cows passed their useful milking life. Usually Guernsies (black and white). Its not so much finishing with oats, its true that western beef cattle are different breeds like Angus or Hereford mostly grass fed (ranched) for the first 2- 2.5 years.
Have never heard of a US feedlot fattening on oats. We grow oats as the firstnyear alfalfa cover crop. Sold mostly for horse feed at the local feed mill. Did some quick research. Canadian Journal of Animal Science published a 2009 study by Gibb et. al. where corn, wheat, barley, and oats were separately tested as finishing beef diet. Oats was least good. More feeding yet less weight gain. Too much roughage, not enough complex carbohydrate.
ristvan, re oats for finishing: I’m in my 80th year and the rancher whom I talked to was maybe a decade and a half older and may well be long gone. I understand you have a dairy farm so are more up-to-date than he was so I’ll defer to you on finishing.
I had 6 kids so I took up mixed farming in eastern Ontario with one Holstein, 50-60 sheep 300 chickens, 100 NZ rabbits, bought a dozen feeder piglets (I know what a pig in a poke looks like because l brought them home in grain sacks) +ducks, geese a wide selection of vegetables and I grew corn for the pigs and birds. I cut all my hay but bought oats mainly for the sheep in winter. Artificial insemination for the cow and sold the yearling calf.
We baked and sold ~100 loaves of bread a week and in spring we collected sap and boiled down ~50gallons of maple syrup and about the same number of lbs of maple sugar. I had been a city slicker before, but came from (free-land late nineteenth century) homesteaders so not exactly a novice.
Ristvan – “Usually Guernsies (black and white).” No, minor point here, it’s Guernseys, and they are a light brown color, while Holstein cows are black and white.
I suspect feed stock varies a lot by region.
I live in central Alberta –> Supplemental feed – Oats – our extended family stopped feeding much oats decades ago. Went to barley. (Well some still feed some rolled oats but mostly rolled barley.) Barley has slightly more protein though each is digested differently. I haven’t fed oats to my performance horses as a supplemental feed for 20+ years, except when I want them to be a little “hotter” than normal – something about the enzymes in oats with some horses. Barely, beet pulp, minerals, vitamins as needed. (Studies have shown that feeding straight oats [to horses] is a waste as a lot comes out the other end looking much the same as when it went in.)
Scientifically for cows, probably not much difference between corn, oats and barley and feed choice would most likely be based on local prices.
Most of the cows/steers around my area are primarily grass fed right up to shipping time. Calves get supplemental feed. Again, feed and animal price dependent as well as time of year – with regional and personal preferences.
http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/beef11489
http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/beef11490
Wayne, horses used for dray, delivering milk, bread and ice in the city (yeah, I go back that far! ) got oats when working and just hay /grass when not. It made their urine fairly brown if they got too much but it was thought they needed it for work. This might be a symptom of a negative reaction to oats but these horses did last a pretty full lifetime.
I grew up about 5 blocks from the old Winnipeg flat races racetrack in Winnipeg and as a kid, used to get 25cents per sack of fresh cut Prairie grass for the race horses. The trainers said the fresh grass gave the horses a better performance the following day. You had to stuff the sack because these guys would dock you for a light measure (estimated by hand). The junk dealer who used to ply the back lanes of the residential ares also used to use a horse drawn wagon. These horses were pretty rundown looking.
ristvan June 16, 2017 at 2:07 pm
RE:Usually Guernsies (black and white).
Rud,
An old Wisconsin farm boy here. A minor quibble… Guernsies are brown and white. Holsteins are black and white. Holsteins are the predominant milk cow in Wisconsin because of their high volume milk production per cow. In my experience though, Jerseys have the highest butter fat and sweetest milk. ‘Top rise’ clotted Jersey cream (almost butter) on a hot baked potato – approaches Heaven!
Thanks for your inputs here, especially the legal aspects – Truly appreciated!
Mac
So killing all those buffalo (grass fed) was really a way of fighting global warming?
” Instead, they suggest that combining the benefits of different production systems, for example organic’s reduced reliance on chemicals with the high yields of conventional systems, would result in a more sustainable agricultural system.”
I’m not sure they understand what leads to the higher yields. Those “chemicals” that the people who promote organic are always railing against are typically what cause the higher yields. If they could get the same yields without spending money on the chemicals they would.
Yes.
And, moreover:
What in the WORLD is wrong with
?
Everyone is a simple combination of natures atoms
Some are autotoxic
Some are toxic in concentration
Many are very benign
and
Much is toxic in high enough concentrations
But all is essential to life
Like Warfarin
Used in very small doses to thin the blood and prevent cloting
AND
Used in much larger doses to Kill Rats (Rat Poison)
Beats me, but I get told all the time how there are chemicals in my proceeded food and how I should avoid them because of that. I simply reply that there are chemicals in everything, since matter is either elemental or chemical. Since we are a composite, we are chemicals. Now if you have a problem with a specific chemical, I want to know which one and why. Is there VX in my processed food? If so I would like to know, because that may affect my decision to eat it. Are those chemicals sodium chloride, dihydrogen monoxide or MSG? Then I probably do not care.
It may shorten the reply by asking what is right with them.
Yes some of them provide benefits short term, but long term ?
ozone. Perhaps, you are a very slow typist and missed lucusloc’s comment just above yours. Do your brain a favor and read it.
Eating some foods may shorten your life but eating no food surely will
FWIW
In the book “Stalin’s Last Crime” (The Doctor’s Plot), Jonathan Brent and Vladimer Naumov, the authors make the case that Stalin was getting ready to re-create the Terror of the 30’s, exterminate all the Jews remaining in Europe, and start WW 3. The reason that the Russians boycotted the UN vote on the Korean War, was to get the non-Communist nations embroiled in a land war in Asia, while the Soviet Army took all of Europe, including the Iberian and Italian peninsulas.
Anyway, the author speculates on Stalin’s death. The symptoms of blood in the urine and hemorrhaging in the stomach indicates Warfarin. Khrushchev and Beria (Head of the KGB) were there and would have done the deed. There would be a certain karma if Stalin had been fed rat poison.
By the way, “Stalin’s Last Crime” is an interesting but somewhat difficult book to read. The Doctor’s Plot was so convoluted with so many little bits, it is hard to keep straight. But, it very well does illustrate “Byzantine”.
ozonebust
I suspect it’s contrary to your perception, but organic farmers use pesticides.
They justify their use by proclaiming they are natural however, they are also uncontrolled.
It is my understanding that you are far more likely to ingest higher levels of chemicals from commercially produced organic foodstuffs than from food treated with modern, controlled chemicals.
Best option is a backyard greenhouse…that way you know exactly how much DDT or Malathion has been used
We make the choice. Go to work and earn money to provide for our family and trust others for our nutritional needs, as they trust us for their commercial needs, or stay at home and farm for an existence.
Neither is wrong, just a matter of personal preference.
Seems like surveys, data censoring & adjustments, and citation of previous studies they agree with along with a few computer models and you can produce any desired scientific finding (that’s too kind, not scientific finding but predetermined desired outcomes).
certified organic growers ARE highly controlled as to what they use/when/and how much.
coppersulphate/Bt/ vinegar for weedkilling, theres some newer products using orangeoil and pine oils for small stage weed control
none of which are toxic to soil biota either.
i grow organically, and use little or no bugkillers bar rotenone in extremis, odd times some copper. for fungals n moulds. chickens do the best weeding n bugkilling for me.
Forgive me for being somewhat sceptical, but your use of pest control chickens hardly scales up to commercial farming. Are you a commercial farmer?
If not, perhaps you don’t have the clout of commercial organic farmers to dictate their use of organic chemicals to the authorities.
““Although high agricultural efficiency consistently correlated with lower environmental impacts, …”.
So mechanized farming, with the use of many chemicals, has lower environmental impacts? Well done, now apologize to your constituency for such heresy.
“While organic systems used less energy, they had higher land use, did not offer benefits in GHGs, and tended to have higher eutrophication and acidification potential per unit of food produced.”
Oh-oh – growing organic food cause more GHG release! And more damage to the water supplies! Again, apologize to your constituency for uttering such heresy.
Recently seen on a T-Shirt in a pizza joint:
I didn’t claw my way to the top of the food chain to eat vegetables
Part of the clawing has included advances in technology which have increased yield as well as productivity, something the authors seem to have neglected…
““A lack of action would result in massive increases in agriculture’s environmental impacts including the clearing of 200 to 1000 million hectares of land for agricultural use, an approximately three-fold increase in fertilizer and pesticide applications, an 80 per cent increase in agricultural GHG emissions and a rapid rise in the prevalence of diet-related diseases such as obesity and diabetes.”
Lots of things wrong here. First, get rid of all the horribly wasteful, stupid, biofuels programs and lots of arable land will be freed up for agriculture. 40% of the US corn crop goes to ethanol production, for no real reason.
In the real world, the applications of pesticides has been refined in technique and the amounts being used are going down. Fertilizers are a must as you have to add back nutrients removed by the plants but that too can be managed so as not to use too much.
As GHGs do not exist and no gas at any concentration in the atmosphere can warm the climate, concerns about GHG emissions are meaningless, except for the fact that more CO2 means more plant growth and more food.
Meat-eating has nothing to do with obesity and diabetes. It is the starches we eat all year round that are the problem. We never evolved eating so much grains and starches. We evolved like bears, eating sugars and starches mainly in late Summer and Fall, as we bulked up for the long winter. The high concentrations of glucose from starches kicks in our natural, preferred conversion of glucose to fat and high glucose concentrations also lead to diabetes. We are 95% carnivore and need more meat and fat, not less.
The whole carbo-loading craze years ago in sports was about as stupid as you can get. All the pasta snarfed down the night before a big game was converted to fat within hours after it was eaten and all the players were fatter the next day. Wow. A psychological boost, maybe, but nothing real.
higley7
Brilliant comment.
higley7,
I would only add to your comment that the primitive peoples eat the whole animal. If anything was given to the dogs it was the muscle meat we now eat only — they would eat the organ meats.
Mother always said I should eat more liver.
Higley7, a gentle correction. True that ~40% of the US corn crop goes to ethanol. But that is gross, not net. The actual net number is 13% by weight, since after ethanol production the resulting 27% distillers grain is an ideal protein enhanced ruminant feed. On my dairy farm, we now sell all the corn to ethanl production then buy back the distillers grain as supplemntal dairy feed. Means we need to grow less alfalfa feed and can grow more corn. Crop rotation stays the same, but the contour mix changes.
Ristvan – yes – and the same applies to Barley and Wheat distillery by products. Barley distillation by products have been fed to cattle for a few hundred years and Wheat distillation products for perhaps 200 years, maybe more. (Feedipedia.org)
The “Carbon” offsets thing is everywhere.
Vision is clouded when one is peeking out through one’s glass bellybutton which I suspect is the case with these “researchers” but it is, indeed, the only way to see when one’s head is firmly stuffed up one’s fundament.
How about cannibalism? It solves two problems at once.
Soylent Green is people.
A high proportion are fatty, saturated with alcohol and in some countries pharmaceutical drugs mostly for no reason. So no thanks, I’ll eat the vegetables etc.
Guess you don’t understand what may be in the veggies.
But is cannibalism really sustainable? And is it truly organic? Granted, in most cases the consumables are ‘free range’ but the use of antibiotics…. and growth hormones are completely uncontrolled! /s
Notice the unmentioned assumption : that fossil fuels and emissionsfor all other uses (which is by far the MOST) will remain the same. Ain’y gonna happen, fella.These guys never heard of electric cars or nuclear power, apparently.
So what he is saying is we need to outlaw organic farms to save the planet. That should make some green heads explode.
for example organic’s reduced reliance on chemicals with the high yields of conventional systems
Yes, let’s take out the thing that results in high yields, but still plan on high yields. If this worked, I could get better fuel economy by sinply putting less gas in my car but driving the same distance.
The stupid, it burns.
Stop having sex, stop eating beef, and stop driving cars. This is the only solution to the evil problems of this world.
Yours truly,
Sad Sack
Unbelievably stupid.
You can say that again, Mr. Smith. 🙂
You can say that again.
Richard G. WHY did you do that? Sigh. (smiling, but a little puzzled)
Unbelievably stupid.
Do as I say, not as I do.
http://928ou1qrl07rlu0w2sh2c8pq.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Obama-Ribs.jpg
Lets analyse the photo shall we……….
Styrofoam made from oil, could this not be on a reusable plate.
None reusable plastic water container, made from oil, transported from who knows where.
Plastic, none reusable condiment containers, made from oil (probably in China)
Plastic fork, made from, you guessed it, oil (probably in China)
Non-reusable disposable napkins, bleached white.
Nice rack of none sustainable pork of beef (or both).
Most likely cooked over gas stoves or deep fryers.
But You, one of the plebs, must eat bugs to be environmentally friendly.
You got it Duncan. Only the (self styled) elite are allowed real food.
Best Bar-b-que joints I know serve it up on butcher paper–need a utensil, pull out your knife.
Personally, I really enjoy vegetables–the ones I harvest from my garden, and the fruit off of my trees. Also really enjoy the goat raised out on the pasture. All just recycled matter and energy.
JVC, are you from Texas? Sounds like any one of the old style BBQ joints here in the heart of Texas. My personal favorite is City Market in Luling ( http://www.lulingcitymarket.com/ ). But that is a ways from the north side of Austin. Closer to home, another traditional place is Louis Mueller’s in Taylor Texas. (https://www.louiemuellerbarbecue.com/ ) A note for you auslanders: REAL Texas BBQ is dry rubbed and smoked beef brisket. Texas BBX sauce is a thin vinegary sauce. (The Love of My Life sneaks a bottle of sticky sweet BBQ sauce into those places. I am so embarrassed, but she is from California.)
Most places also have different sausages, pork ribs, “pulled pork”, chicken and or turkey. My favorite are the beef ribs from the County Line in Austin or the Salt Lick in Dripping Springs/Round Rock. But the best beef ribs are the ones from Big Cat here in Cedar Park. ( https://www.facebook.com/BigCatBbq )
Hey guys. BBQ is a Texas thing. You may not understand.
Jon–yes I am from Texas–lived in and around Austin (Liberty Hill) for a long time, and have enjoyed BBQ at all of the places you mentioned except for that “Big Cat” place –must be fairly new. One of my favorites is Coopers in Llano–especially their beef ribs, and the “big chop” , but since moving out to Brown county haven’t gotten down there very much. Wish I could remember the name of the steak joint just outside of Waco where the steaks were served on butcher paper also–that would be back in the mid 60’s,–think it was the LoneStar inn??? People would wait in line there too.
In my country we have plates,knives,forks,cups,glasses and bowls. What’s with all this third world eating style with fingers out of boxes?
lol, I realize you were having fun, Rev, but, I just have to say this (I’m an American): there is just something very satisfying about eating some foods (e.g., pizza, sandwiches, raw veggies, brownies) with your hands. I can’t explain it. I’ve thought about it before (when eating in a formal setting where I HAD to keep my fingers neat and tidy), “Why is eating this with a fork so much less pleasurable?” — Answer: just is. Shrug.
Wish I had the answer to that mystery. It seems from your comment that British people (and from my experience, Germans and Austrians) as a whole do not share this trait, thus, I think it may be genetic… . but, I’m mostly English, so…. still wondering! 🙂
The Reverend Badger.
HeHeHe……that made me laugh.
I was born and brought up in Hong Kong before moving to the UK. Western table etiquette was considered appallingly unhygienic, barbaric and revolting, never mind overcooking food until it is nutritionally barren, then chucking the valuable stock from cooked vegetables down the sink, or throwing the carcass of a chicken away without making soup.
A western friend of mine observed in horror, of a mutual friends Mauritian wife ” she makes three meals out a chicken!”
I replied “wasteful bitch, I’m a Scot, I can make four”.
Apparently a horribly failed business venture but at least it was not tax dollars wasted (and not a hypocrite). Alas I could not resist…….
http://theresurgent.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/trumpsteaks.jpg
Don’t set yourself up for failure in your marketing tagline. If that’s not in The Art of Deal, it ought to be. :]
And Janice, it’s because you’re depriving 90% of your senses from the experience! Raising finger food up to your mouth and taking a full bite engages much more than just your taste buds. You deliver the aroma right up to your nose (smell enhances taste). The food makes contact with the entirety of your mouth (teeth, tongue, cheeks, gums, inside of lips) so the flavor lingers longer. Even your eyes relax from the warmth of hot food moving up the sinuses and into your tear ducts. And of course, the visceral difference of gripping the actual food versus metal or plastic.
A dainty bite with a fork engages only the back teeth and tongue. 😐