Global Warming's Elephant in the Living Room
In a recent exchange with a reader, I defended sustainable livestock practices as essential in certain climates, while my reader insisted that veganism was the only environmentally responsible diet. I stand by my position: livestock acts as energy storage (batteries if you will) in climates where the growing season is only 1/4 of the year. While its efficiency is poor, and while veganism is doubtless a better energy option where it is practical, when done sustainably, livestock provides a means to live on land that would otherwise be uninhabitable using local resources. In my view, were we to adopt a policy of veganism on local resources, we would send the population of roughly 1/3 of the world's currently-inhabitable real estate toward the equator to more vegetable-friendly climes, putting more pressure on land already stressed by the population depending on it for food.
This suggests another aspect of the global warming problem that is often overlooked: Global warming is caused by too many people producing too many greenhouse gases.
We usually focus on the second part of that sentence: too many greenhouse gases. And indeed, the U.S. in particular is exceedingly wasteful. We use more energy per capita than almost any other nation, consuming roughly a quarter of the world supply. And what does it get us? We rank 42nd in life expectancy, and we are neither the most secure nation nor do we have the highest standard of living. Based on our crime figures, we are not the happiest nation, nor are we the most literate. One wonders exactly what all that waste gets us.
But that is only half the equation. No one wants to talk about "too many people." If America's per capita emissions were reduced by half, we would produce half as many greenhouse gases. Duh. And if its population was also reduced by half, we'd have reduced our emissions by 3/4.
But wait, there's more: India ranks 4th in greenhouse gas emmissions— and 77% of its population lives on $.50 a day or less. That's 836 million people, or 2-1/2 times the population of the U.S., who produce almost no emissions. Which suggests that the majority of India's emissions are produced by the 23% of its population (249 million) who may drive cars, ride tour buses, have electricity and major appliances, and make trips by commercial airline. And if poverty in India was eliminated, the country's emissions could quadruple.
This is not to blame India for our woes; the U.S. contributes more to global warming than any other nation. But it does suggest a fallacy in our approach.
The solution to global warming involves discussing "rights" we may have to give up: driving a gas-guzzling SUV, having a personal motor vehicle, burning as much electricity as we can afford, and so forth. But there's one "right" that has not been put on the table in any discussion I've read, and that is the "right" to reproduce. It seems to be a sacred cow that no one dares touch— but I view it more as the elephant in the living room that everyone pretends isn't there.
Global warming is caused by too many people producing too many greenhouse gases. To focus on only the production side while world population continues to grow is to condemn much of the world to eternal poverty— and not American-style poverty, with cell phones and Nikes, but grinding poverty the likes of which most Americans never see. If global standards of living are to rise while reducing emissions, population must fall. And that is something no one wants to talk about.
This suggests another aspect of the global warming problem that is often overlooked: Global warming is caused by too many people producing too many greenhouse gases.
We usually focus on the second part of that sentence: too many greenhouse gases. And indeed, the U.S. in particular is exceedingly wasteful. We use more energy per capita than almost any other nation, consuming roughly a quarter of the world supply. And what does it get us? We rank 42nd in life expectancy, and we are neither the most secure nation nor do we have the highest standard of living. Based on our crime figures, we are not the happiest nation, nor are we the most literate. One wonders exactly what all that waste gets us.
But that is only half the equation. No one wants to talk about "too many people." If America's per capita emissions were reduced by half, we would produce half as many greenhouse gases. Duh. And if its population was also reduced by half, we'd have reduced our emissions by 3/4.
But wait, there's more: India ranks 4th in greenhouse gas emmissions— and 77% of its population lives on $.50 a day or less. That's 836 million people, or 2-1/2 times the population of the U.S., who produce almost no emissions. Which suggests that the majority of India's emissions are produced by the 23% of its population (249 million) who may drive cars, ride tour buses, have electricity and major appliances, and make trips by commercial airline. And if poverty in India was eliminated, the country's emissions could quadruple.
This is not to blame India for our woes; the U.S. contributes more to global warming than any other nation. But it does suggest a fallacy in our approach.
The solution to global warming involves discussing "rights" we may have to give up: driving a gas-guzzling SUV, having a personal motor vehicle, burning as much electricity as we can afford, and so forth. But there's one "right" that has not been put on the table in any discussion I've read, and that is the "right" to reproduce. It seems to be a sacred cow that no one dares touch— but I view it more as the elephant in the living room that everyone pretends isn't there.
Global warming is caused by too many people producing too many greenhouse gases. To focus on only the production side while world population continues to grow is to condemn much of the world to eternal poverty— and not American-style poverty, with cell phones and Nikes, but grinding poverty the likes of which most Americans never see. If global standards of living are to rise while reducing emissions, population must fall. And that is something no one wants to talk about.
What is in your refrigerator?
Eggs...Ground beef... Milk...Cheese... butter? One of the largest energy consuming devices in almost every household is needed to hold animal products. We can discuss whether tomatoes or apples really need refrigeration, but you get the point. My home has only a really small, energy efficient fridge, and one that I could do without... but my wife 'needs' cold beverages.
And your post brings up another question: What are 'sustainable livestock practices'?
To kill a cow and feed a farmer's family requires refrigerating leftover meat. Not sustainable for the world.
To kill a cow and feed a neighborhood requires a distribution system- inefficient as in all types of food, but moreso because meat requires more packaging and refrigerated storage.
Also, you would have to kill the animal at the instant it returned the most meat for calorie consumed. There is diminishing return the older an animal gets.
From what I gather, the only environmentally friendly meat diet is one where you hunt wild game. And do we want 6 billion people hunting???
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Your question to me is an interesting one: what is in my fridge? The answer is: quite a number of things, from black bean sauce, cabbage, carrots, apples, whole wheat pancake mix, peanut butter, salad dressing, last night's leftovers, strawberry preserves, and other vegetable products that won't survive 100 degree heat, to eggs, cheese, sour cream, milk, and other animal-produced products, and yes there is some meat. And my wife, too, likes her cold beverages. Interestingly, the non-animal products take up as much room as everything else combined. We could theoretically buy fresh produce every day, eliminating the need for most of that refrigeration, except that we live 26 miles from the nearest market and the fuel used would far exceed any benefit.
As to sustainability, we generate enough electricity from solar to cover most of our needs, and we're working on expanding (as our budget permits) to cover all needs except our biggest one: heating. We're working on that one through solar space heating ideas, but I lack confidence that we will ever be able to generate enough heat from other sources to eliminate electric space heating. Still, if a family generates from renewable resources all the power it needs for refrigerated storage, is that not sustainable?
As to a distribution system for a neighborhood, it requires no more transportation than what people already use. I don't need to use a refigerated truck to take eggs or cheese to the post office, where my neighbors buy them, any more than they need a special truck to carry their produce, which I get there. It's a central location to which everyone in town comes anyway. As to how much refrigeration meat really requires, tropical countries with NO refrigeration or packaging still distribute meat. I've seen it.
Now here's my question to you: for those of us who live in climates with hard winters and poor soil, what would you have us eat? Soy doesn't grow here, nor do peanuts or cashews, and beans are unreliable. Is sagebrush salad on the menu? Would you have us eat food trucked in from six hundred miles away (CA) or more? Is it more environmentally friendly to transport vegetables long distances than to eat meat? Or would you prefer that we all move to California, close to the source, where farmland is increasingly being turned into suburbs? If I sound a bit tongue in cheek, it's because too often those who criticize have few alternatives to offer. You've suggested veganism as the ONLY responsible diet, and I'm asking you for a practical application.
I used to be vegetarian (9-1/2 years), and I have no particular objection to it. I think my wife could be convinced to eat mostly vegetarian, too. But as we try to eat more local food, we find that this is less and less possible. The land here just won't do it.
Since the land won't produce proteins we can eat, our goal is to produce our own eggs and cheese using local resources, ideally from our own land. Goats and chickens are great for this, because they eat what grows here naturally (even the invasive species). And in the process, we inevitably have "extra" animals that we eat as meat, but we don't raise animals for that purpose. Feed comes from our soil, or from local farms. All the waste goes back into the soil. Energy is increasingly generated on-site. Plus we have extra food to sell to our community.
Clearly this is not the most efficient use of raw calories, but I believe it is the most efficient use of EDIBLE calories. Because a calorie we can't eat does us no good at all. And if there's a better way, I'm open to suggestion.
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"... strawberry preserves, and other vegetable products that won't survive 100 degree heat..."
Surely you don't want us to believe that you keep your living quarters at outside temperatures. Apples, carrots, cabbage, and especially peanut butter do quite well at room temperatures.
Oil and vinegar are perfect salad dressings (ask Europeans) and do quite well at room temperature as well.
As far as solar power to provide energy: there is a real elephant in the room that no one is talking about. PV cells are a type of transducer that converts EM waves into electrical energy. Unfortunately, until nanotechnology allows cells to convert FIR, UV, and parts of the spectrum into energy, current technology only allows the conversion of visible and near visible light waves. This requires cleaning... and this requires fresh water (salt scratches). There is a huge danger that wide adoption of PV and solar troughs will threaten water supplies. And this will affect the poor the most.
As far as population growth... the current edition of Spin magazine has an interesting read. Tracking waste at events such as Live Earth and Phish concerts (supposedly environmentally friendly crowds) produced per capita trash 13 times greater than citizens in overcrowded third world areas.
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"Surely you don't want us to believe that you keep your living quarters at outside temperatures."
Uh, we don't have A/C. Do you? Our afternoon temperature inside the house is typically five to ten degrees cooler than outside. Today it was 95 outside, 88 inside. When it's 108 outside, well, you do the math. And my experience of peanut butter at that temp is that (unless it is treated with lots of chemicals) it separates and becomes unusable as a spread. Useful to drink, though. As to salad dressings, while I agree with you, my wife prefers Ranch. I wonder too how much water it really takes to wash down a 1KW array like ours, and why it doesn't go straight back into the water table as drainage?
I also find it interesting that (1) you haven't answered my question, and (2) you seem to suggest that nothing less than optimal efficiency will do. While I support optimal efficiency as a goal, we've got to live in the real world. Or else eat a gun, which might do wonders for the population issue (while adversely affecting methane emissions).
As to trash levels, in India they have a separate caste that makes a living picking up (and reusing) trash. As I noted in the original post, poverty tends to reduce emissions, too. OTOH, there's a link between poverty and birth rates, which affects the other pice of the equation.
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We use a geothermal system. Coupled with rolondos and passive design allows for livable quarters. That's sustainable living in this region.
"I wonder too how much water it really takes to wash down a 1KW array like ours, and why it doesn't go straight back into the water table as drainage?"
Producing the PV cells required a lot of water... as does any silicon based technology (ask Intel) and it's not the type of water waste that you want going back into the supply. As someone who works in the industry, I can assure you that if you are not keeping your panels clean, you can reduce efficiency by more than 70%. So on top of the water required for production, you have to use water for maintenance.
"for those of us who live in climates with hard winters and poor soil, what would you have us eat?"
Vegetables. It would be a bit of a cheap shot to demand that you move from an area that is incredibly difficult to adopt an earth friendly lifestyle, so going vegan is the best for you and the earth. (One household ending their use of canned goods isn't going to put a dent in the distribution systems of Walmart/Grocery stores.) Short of that, I guess you should hunt.
Raising livestock takes a toll on the earth and you are producing an environment that animals were not meant to live. It's a difficult choice but the right one.
I have already posted the numerous scientific organizations that have backed up this position. The American diet is THE lifestyle choice that makes us/them energy hogs. We can all agree that the meat industry is not sustainable, and that the meat industry is required for society to support meat/dairy consumers. So let's end the cesspools, the clear cutting of forests, the methane production, and the waste of vegetation, and go vegan!
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So let me get this straight: you would prefer that we eat canned vegetables trucked in from California and Mexico, which are generally considered the biggest food transportation hogs because of their weight?
"We can all agree that the meat industry is not sustainable,"
Absolutely.
"and that the meat industry is required for society to support meat/dairy consumers."
If you mean those who do not raise their own and rely on mass production, yes that's true. But the same is true for vegetables. The corporate vegetable "industry" is unsustainable and far, far less environmentally friendly than small "family" farms. Hopefully you buy your vegan diet from small farms rather than WalMart?
The same is true for meat: factory farming is unsustainable. Small producers are not. You'll notice that in my posts I have described our "operation" (if you can call it that) as producing primarily eggs and cheese, with meat as a secondary product (essentially recycling). I can't giove you the calorie conversion, but it's clearly more efficient than producing meat alone. Plus, someone has to raise animals, else where does the fertilizer come from to grow vegetables? Oil?
I find it hard to characterize what we're doing as putting animals in an an "environment that animals were not meant to live" since birds and animals quite similar to goats already live there. In fact, I would have more of a problem converting mass acreage to agriculture, eliminating the natural vegetation, than grazing a few animals that can live in harmony with what's already there.
But what I don't understand is, how do you make the jump from a small family farm to clear-cutting forests? It's as much of a logical connection as saying vegans are causing soil erosion and global warming because of the corporate soybean farmers. I hope you'll agree that how we choose our sources is as important as what we eat. Of course, folks in the city, have a lot less control over their sources, and so may be less aware that some are more destructive than others.
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"... you would prefer that we eat canned vegetables trucked in from California and Mexico..."
Yes. Livestock also contributes to carbon dioxide emissions, methane emissions (20 times more potent than CO2), water consumption, waste...
"Hopefully you buy your vegan diet from small farms rather than WalMart?"
Luckily, I live in a town with a terrific farmers market. We also have our own vegetable gardens
www.mnsi.net/~jhlavac/gardening/squarefoot.htm
,can some of our produce, and also consume canned goods.
"Plus, someone has to raise animals, else where does the fertilizer come from to grow vegetables? Oil?"
80% of the vegetation grown is used to feed livestock in the United States. This increases the stress on the farmland which is why petro based fertilizers are used. Smart farming (crop rotation, regional based foods) eliminates the need for animal and oil/gas based fertilizers. Anyone who has their own garden can attest.
"But what I don't understand is, how do you make the jump from a small family farm to clear-cutting forests?"
It's the small family farm that is destroying the Brazilian rainforests. It is family owned cattle ranching that is having the most detrimental impact. Americans are trying to educate them but it's difficult... and 50% of the meat produced from the region goes to the U.S.
There are plenty of resources on the web to research the impact being a meat eater has on the environment.
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The more I read of your arguments, the more I realize we will never agree. Rain forests. Beef. Slash-and-burn agriculture. Acreage devoted to feed production. None of these apply to us. You know that, having read my previous replies. Yet your argument against continues to cite factors that we have eliminated (or are diligently working to do so).
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DJ:
Thanks for posting this. You are absolutely right about raising the issue of earth's carrying capacity. The fertility rate is coming down in western Europe but remains especially high in countries that do not give equal status to women.
Part of the solution is to push these countries to value and educate women so that they may participate fully in society. When this happens, women get too busy to have a lot of kids.
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