No, WCAX TV3, Owning a Dog Is NOT a “Wrong Climate Choice”

Guest essay by Linnea Lueken. Originally published at ClimateRealism.

Vermont’s WCAX 3 news station, posted an article from the Associated Press (AP) titled “People often make wrong climate choices, a study says. One surprise is owning a dog,” in which the writers claim that owning a dog is bad for the climate because they are meat eaters. This is completely misguided. Meat eating does not have an inordinate impact on the global climate and studies show that dog ownership can be beneficial to peoples’ mental health – an important consideration in a period where the media coverage of climate change is stoking climate-fear-related anxiety and mental health issues.

The post summarizes points from a recent study from the National Academy of Sciences, which looked at survey participants’ beliefs when it came to the impact of their individual efforts to “fight” climate change. Participants apparently ““weren’t very accurate when assessing how much those actions contributed to climate change, which is caused mostly by the release of greenhouse gases that happen when fuels like gasoline, oil and coal are burned.”

Aside from the point that it is very much not an established fact that most climate change is caused by human use of fossil fuels or is dangerous, it is interesting that the study ranks some very intrusive climate efforts as low-impact. Those included things like using energy efficient appliances and lightbulbs, and recycling. Those individual efforts are things that the U.S. government has pushed for decades, imposing burdensome regulations on consumers and appliance manufacturers alike, as well as hijacking public school classes to promote the merits of recycling.

Associated Press’ writers claim that that the three actions that “help the climate” most are avoiding flying, using renewable electricity, and “choosing not to get a dog.”

These three items were consistently underestimated by study participants as effective mitigating climate change, at least according to the authors. The most offensive is probably the claim that dog ownership is particularly harmful to the planet.

The article claims that because dogs are carnivores, they are a significant contributor to climate change since “farm animals, which will become food, release methane, a greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change.” They claim that beef is a particular problem on that front.

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) it is simply false to claim cattle raising is a significant contributor to emissions, let alone global climate change.

The EPA reports that livestock as a whole contribute 3.9 percent of the United States’ greenhouse gas emissions, and cattle by themselves contribute just 2 percent.

Figuring out what proportion of that beef is then turned into pet food in general and dog food specifically is almost impossible, but it would seem safe to assume it’s very minimal, especially since most commercial dog foods outside of specialty brands are made with animal byproducts that might otherwise go unused. Check the ingredients listed on the label of most dry and canned dog food and you’ll find that even when beef is an ingredient and listed first, it makes up a small portion of the overall content of the food.

Climate Realism has covered discussed methane a lot, but it is worth re-iterating, especially as the media and climate alarm machine target man’s best friend. Methane itself is yet another trace gas, and while it does play a role in the atmosphere’s energy balance, it does not stay in the atmosphere for nearly as long as other gases like carbon dioxide, and much of its ability to trap heat is already covered by water vapor, which plays a much stronger role.

A paper written by physicists William Happer, Ph.D., of Princeton University and W. A. van Wijngaarden, Ph.D., of Toronto’s York University, says that “the contribution of methane to the annual increase in forcing is one tenth (30/300) that of carbon dioxide.”

So whatever percentage of cattle emissions result from your dog eating beef-based food, or even all the dogs in the country, they still have such a miniscule impact on any warming, it can hardly be taken seriously as an “underestimated” contributor to climate change.

Besides all of that, climate alarmists probably should think about getting a dog (if they are responsible enough) because having a dog in particular is known to reduce anxiety, which, as Climate Realism has covered, climate alarmists seem to suffer inordinately from. Repeated studies show that pet ownership in general, and dog ownership in particular can reduce stress and anxiety. Thus, a canine companion can help fight the mental illnesses and anxiety that the daily torrent of false stories claiming that human-caused climate change is destroying the planet is generating in some people. Owning a dog can be doubly effective in shoring up mental health, if those alarmed about climate change come to recognize the fact that dog ownership is not hurting the planet.

The AP, WCAX 3, and the study authors are not accurately portraying the true state of the planet. They certainly have no place talking anyone who wants to own dog out of doing so, at least not as a means of preventing climate change.