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Except that my diet and car have absolutely nothing to do with the problem. You're fixating on CO2 when the problem the article talks about is clearly environm

Except that my diet and car have absolutely nothing to do with the problem. You're fixating on CO2 when the problem the article talks about is clearly environmental destruction. Canada and the US produce all of our own beef. There is no environmental destruction happening here for beef production. We can in fact produce much more beef using the existing idle grasslands we have now. And the only relevant problem from cars here is the mining, which is worse with an electric vehicle. Nothing you suggested even attempts to address the issue at all.

GVIrish 8y ago
The energy, land, and water required to produce 1 lb of beef is several times greater than the resources required to produce 1 lb of chicken, which in turn is several times greater than the resources required to produce 1 lb of the average vegetable. Not only that, but methane emissions from cattle contribute to climate change. About a third of anthropogenic methane emissions in the US are from livestock. Not saying we need to stop eating beef completely, but if diets shifted away from beef it would have a number of positive environmental impacts.
- deialtrous 8y ago
  None of those things have anything to do with the discussion though, which is developing nations torching natural ecosystems. Neither my beef nor my car is in any way a factor in this. Also, your comparison is disingenuous. A pound of beef or chicken contains far more calories and protein than a pound of any vegetable. And grass fed beef actually requires less energy to produce than vegetables.
  - wiz21c 8y ago
    for the beef : https://slate.com/technology/2010/12/is-grass-fed-beef-better-for-the-environment.html https://slate.com/technology/2010/12/is-grass-fed-beef-bette... for the car : just stop using a car, that'll be better for the environment.
    - deialtrous 8y ago
      I do not understand the relevance of that tabloid article. It has absolutely nothing to do with what I said. I live in Canada. All my beef comes from Canada. The fact that people in other countries burn forests to graze cattle does not mean that Canadians consuming Canadian beef cause those other countries to burn forests. My beef consumption is 100% irrelevant, they will burn the same amount of forest regardless of what I eat, because they are not burning it to feed me.
      - arbitrary_name 8y ago
        If you stop eating beef, others can eat Canadian beef and not brazilian beef. Your consumption has an effect.
        deialtrous 8y ago
        That assumes that Canadian beef production is at or near its limit. It is not even close. We could produce far more, but there is no market for it. So if Canadian beef consumption goes down, all that happens is Canadian beef production goes down. No impact is had on the amazon. We can be very confident of this because Canadian beef consumption has gone down, and Canadian beef production went down with it, not Brazilian beef production.
        deialtrous2 8y ago
        That assumes that Canadian beef production is at or near its limit. It is not even close. We could produce far more, but there is no market for it. So if Canadian beef consumption goes down, all that happens is Canadian beef production goes down. No impact is had on the amazon. We can be very confident of this because Canadian beef consumption has gone down, and Canadian beef production went down with it, not Brazilian beef production.
  - curiousity 8y ago
    Beef is a product made from cows. Cows require land, food, water, and infrastructure. Producing beef leads to the destruction of ecosystems, like the Amazon Rainforest [1]. By consuming beef, you are contributing to this phenomenon the article discusses. The emissions from your car, similarly, contribute to climate change and the destruction that goes with it as well. The lifestyle one chooses to lead, the products one consumes, and the decisions a person makes are all very much factors in the reduction of animal populations. I'm starting to believe that you aren't arguing in good faith, in part because your statements are just thrown out there without any evidence or citation. Sure, a pound of beef or chicken contains more protein or calories than a pound of vegetables. But that's a nonsensical and misleading claim - many more pounds of vegetables went into producing that pound of beef and chicken. Many of those calories, by the way, were exhausted by the metabolic processes of those animals too. A much more efficient utilization of resources would involve just using those vegetable calories directly. [1] http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/194008291300600309 http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/194008291300600...
    - deialtrous2 8y ago
      >Beef is a product made from cows. Cows are not globally fungible. Beef production in the US has absolutely nothing to do with the amazon being destroyed. There is no part of the amazon in the US, no US cattle are raised in the amazon, no feed fed to US cattle comes from the amazon. US beef production is not related at all. >I'm starting to believe that you aren't arguing in good faith, in part because your statements are just thrown out there without any evidence or citation. Sure, a pound of beef or chicken contains more protein or calories than a pound of vegetables. But that's a nonsensical and misleading claim I did not make that claim. I responded to someone else making a misleading claim. Assuming bad faith makes it more likely to misread things. >many more pounds of vegetables went into producing that pound of beef and chicken. No vegetables go into producing it. Grain might, but vegetables do not. Lettuce is far more wasteful of land than beef is, but we do not see campaigns against lettuce consumption, only against beef consumption. This is not logical.
- toasterlovin 8y ago
  You should be comparing calories, not pounds. Also, it really depends on what vegetables you're comparing (there is a 50x range in the amount of calories provided per input for plants as a class). Beef is generally less resource intensive than leafy green vegetables, but more resource intensive than most starchy vegetables. Chicken is less resource intensive than basically all plant food sources except for peanuts, potatoes, oils, and grains. A brief glance at what most vegetarians and vegans are eating leads me to believe that their diets are probably not that much more environmentally friendly than your average meat eater. The real key is shifting toward inexpensive cheeses, milk, and oils for protein and fats and then consuming a lot more carbohydrates in the form of potatoes and grains. And, really, the biggest impact environmental impact that most people can effect with their diet is not eating out as much.
  - GVIrish 8y ago
    Yes if you want to get into detail, one should compare environmental cost per calorie. Even then, beef still is worse than chicken and most vegetables. I recognize that some vegetables are far more resource intensive than others, which is why I stated 'the average' vegetable. If we wanted to shift diets towards being more environmentally friendly, we'd have to be selective and deliberate about how we do it. I would argue that shifting diets rather than trying to get everyone to become vegetarians (that don't eat lettuce) is the most sensible path. It would be hard to convince everyone never to eat a steak again, but if you can get people to go from eating 50 lbs of beef a year to 30 or 40 lbs and shifting to chicken and legumes it could make a sizable difference. Would be even better if the developing world went straight to sustainable diets rather than roaring towards beef-heavy diets.
- 08-15 8y ago
  > The energy, land, and water required to produce 1 lb of beef is several times greater than It also tastes several times greater, and in exchange is several times more expensive. > Not saying we need to stop eating beef completely, but... Funny, every time an activist says "we", I understand "everybody else". Pro tip: you do not make friends by telling people how to live their lives.
jamil7 8y ago
> You're fixating on CO2 when the problem the article talks about is clearly environmental destruction. Canada and the US produce all of our own beef. Exactly, environmental destruction caused by the beef industry, an incredibly inefficient process if you compare the land and water requirements vs other types of protein. > There is no environmental destruction happening here for beef production. This is a huge blanket statement to make as well as being factually inaccurate.
- JoeAltmaier 8y ago
  That's a story that's often repeated here on HN. But it doesn't hold up much under scrutiny. American pasture lands, for instance, are not normally arable lands (cannot be used for cropland). And meat animals use less resources per pound of protein that vegetable sources. Certainly less plowing. I'm always stunned by the idea that somehow raising millions of cattle is destroying the planet, yet the millions of buffalo that roamed the prairie before we arrived were natural and therefor good.
  - osense 8y ago
    > And meat animals use less resources per pound of protein that vegetable sources. What? There's literally hundreds of scientific articles out there that establish the opposite, e.g. [1] [1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding-meat-and-dairy-is-single-biggest-way-to-reduce-your-impact-on-earth https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding... Edit: Where do you think the protein in cattle comes from? Isn't it… plants? That the cattle eat? Once eaten, the cattle expend some energy to live and then we kill them for meat. By not eating animals, you cut out the middleman and waste less energy.
    - deialtrous 8y ago
      That premise is only accurate if you are planning to have everyone consume livestock feed. If that is the plan, then you shouldn't be fixating on beef, you should be going after almost all crops we grow, which produce just as few calories per acre as beef, and even lower protein per acre. Depending on where you draw the line, your argument effectively requires all farms to only grow a small number of very high calorie crops like field corn and potatoes.
osense 8y ago
I think you may be wrong here. Firstly, most cattle is not grazed on open pastures: "[…] the current pastureland grass resource can support only 27% of the current beef supply" [1] Rather, they are kept on feed imported most likely from South America, and "Agriculture is the direct driver for worldwide deforestation" [2]. So how does attempting to minimize deforestation not address the issue? [1] http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aad401 http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aad401 [2] https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/09/120925091608.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/09/120925091608.h...
- deialtrous 8y ago
  Literally all beef in Canada and the US is grazed on open pastures. The majority of it is sent to feed lots for the last couple of months of their life to be fattened on grain, but they spend the first year in pasture no matter what. Second, absolutely none of the feed is imported from South America. It is from Nebraska and Iowa in the US, and Alberta and Saskatchewan in Canada. Both nations produce massive amounts of grain, far more than needed to feed all the livestock we raise, much less just the cattle. Third, this is the point, it isn't attempting to minimize deforestation. My eating beef or not eating beef does absolutely nothing, as my beef did not cause any deforestation. My habits do not cause people half way around the world to change their behavior. And just as a note of interest, your first link is quite incorrect. It uses the lowest production pasture figure for its math rather than the average, it does not consider the idea that grass fed beef becoming a major industry might involve people switching to more productive grazing systems which we know produce at least double the calories per acre. It ignores the huge quantity of idle grassland we currently have which could be used for cattle production. And it neglects to factor in the millions of acres of corn and soy fields that would no longer be needed for cattle feed and can be converted to pasture. https://bovinepracticum.blogspot.com/2018/03/another-land-use-debate-feedlot.html https://bovinepracticum.blogspot.com/2018/03/another-land-us...
  - osense 8y ago
    Thanks. I'm inclined to believe you on this as it seems reasonable, although I have to say that a blogpost is not the most trustworthy source of information :)

GVIrish 8y ago

The energy, land, and water required to produce 1 lb of beef is several times greater than the resources required to produce 1 lb of chicken, which in turn is several times greater than the resources required to produce 1 lb of the average vegetable. Not only that, but methane emissions from cattle contribute to climate change. About a third of anthropogenic methane emissions in the US are from livestock. Not saying we need to stop eating beef completely, but if diets shifted away from beef it would have a number of positive environmental impacts.

deialtrous 8y ago
None of those things have anything to do with the discussion though, which is developing nations torching natural ecosystems. Neither my beef nor my car is in any way a factor in this. Also, your comparison is disingenuous. A pound of beef or chicken contains far more calories and protein than a pound of any vegetable. And grass fed beef actually requires less energy to produce than vegetables.
- wiz21c 8y ago
  for the beef : https://slate.com/technology/2010/12/is-grass-fed-beef-better-for-the-environment.html https://slate.com/technology/2010/12/is-grass-fed-beef-bette... for the car : just stop using a car, that'll be better for the environment.
  - deialtrous 8y ago
    I do not understand the relevance of that tabloid article. It has absolutely nothing to do with what I said. I live in Canada. All my beef comes from Canada. The fact that people in other countries burn forests to graze cattle does not mean that Canadians consuming Canadian beef cause those other countries to burn forests. My beef consumption is 100% irrelevant, they will burn the same amount of forest regardless of what I eat, because they are not burning it to feed me.
    - arbitrary_name 8y ago
      If you stop eating beef, others can eat Canadian beef and not brazilian beef. Your consumption has an effect.
      - deialtrous 8y ago
        That assumes that Canadian beef production is at or near its limit. It is not even close. We could produce far more, but there is no market for it. So if Canadian beef consumption goes down, all that happens is Canadian beef production goes down. No impact is had on the amazon. We can be very confident of this because Canadian beef consumption has gone down, and Canadian beef production went down with it, not Brazilian beef production.
      - deialtrous2 8y ago
        That assumes that Canadian beef production is at or near its limit. It is not even close. We could produce far more, but there is no market for it. So if Canadian beef consumption goes down, all that happens is Canadian beef production goes down. No impact is had on the amazon. We can be very confident of this because Canadian beef consumption has gone down, and Canadian beef production went down with it, not Brazilian beef production.
- curiousity 8y ago
  Beef is a product made from cows. Cows require land, food, water, and infrastructure. Producing beef leads to the destruction of ecosystems, like the Amazon Rainforest [1]. By consuming beef, you are contributing to this phenomenon the article discusses. The emissions from your car, similarly, contribute to climate change and the destruction that goes with it as well. The lifestyle one chooses to lead, the products one consumes, and the decisions a person makes are all very much factors in the reduction of animal populations. I'm starting to believe that you aren't arguing in good faith, in part because your statements are just thrown out there without any evidence or citation. Sure, a pound of beef or chicken contains more protein or calories than a pound of vegetables. But that's a nonsensical and misleading claim - many more pounds of vegetables went into producing that pound of beef and chicken. Many of those calories, by the way, were exhausted by the metabolic processes of those animals too. A much more efficient utilization of resources would involve just using those vegetable calories directly. [1] http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/194008291300600309 http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/194008291300600...
  - deialtrous2 8y ago
    >Beef is a product made from cows. Cows are not globally fungible. Beef production in the US has absolutely nothing to do with the amazon being destroyed. There is no part of the amazon in the US, no US cattle are raised in the amazon, no feed fed to US cattle comes from the amazon. US beef production is not related at all. >I'm starting to believe that you aren't arguing in good faith, in part because your statements are just thrown out there without any evidence or citation. Sure, a pound of beef or chicken contains more protein or calories than a pound of vegetables. But that's a nonsensical and misleading claim I did not make that claim. I responded to someone else making a misleading claim. Assuming bad faith makes it more likely to misread things. >many more pounds of vegetables went into producing that pound of beef and chicken. No vegetables go into producing it. Grain might, but vegetables do not. Lettuce is far more wasteful of land than beef is, but we do not see campaigns against lettuce consumption, only against beef consumption. This is not logical.
toasterlovin 8y ago
You should be comparing calories, not pounds. Also, it really depends on what vegetables you're comparing (there is a 50x range in the amount of calories provided per input for plants as a class). Beef is generally less resource intensive than leafy green vegetables, but more resource intensive than most starchy vegetables. Chicken is less resource intensive than basically all plant food sources except for peanuts, potatoes, oils, and grains. A brief glance at what most vegetarians and vegans are eating leads me to believe that their diets are probably not that much more environmentally friendly than your average meat eater. The real key is shifting toward inexpensive cheeses, milk, and oils for protein and fats and then consuming a lot more carbohydrates in the form of potatoes and grains. And, really, the biggest impact environmental impact that most people can effect with their diet is not eating out as much.
- GVIrish 8y ago
  Yes if you want to get into detail, one should compare environmental cost per calorie. Even then, beef still is worse than chicken and most vegetables. I recognize that some vegetables are far more resource intensive than others, which is why I stated 'the average' vegetable. If we wanted to shift diets towards being more environmentally friendly, we'd have to be selective and deliberate about how we do it. I would argue that shifting diets rather than trying to get everyone to become vegetarians (that don't eat lettuce) is the most sensible path. It would be hard to convince everyone never to eat a steak again, but if you can get people to go from eating 50 lbs of beef a year to 30 or 40 lbs and shifting to chicken and legumes it could make a sizable difference. Would be even better if the developing world went straight to sustainable diets rather than roaring towards beef-heavy diets.
08-15 8y ago
> The energy, land, and water required to produce 1 lb of beef is several times greater than It also tastes several times greater, and in exchange is several times more expensive. > Not saying we need to stop eating beef completely, but... Funny, every time an activist says "we", I understand "everybody else". Pro tip: you do not make friends by telling people how to live their lives.

jamil7 8y ago

> You're fixating on CO2 when the problem the article talks about is clearly environmental destruction. Canada and the US produce all of our own beef. Exactly, environmental destruction caused by the beef industry, an incredibly inefficient process if you compare the land and water requirements vs other types of protein. > There is no environmental destruction happening here for beef production. This is a huge blanket statement to make as well as being factually inaccurate.

JoeAltmaier 8y ago
That's a story that's often repeated here on HN. But it doesn't hold up much under scrutiny. American pasture lands, for instance, are not normally arable lands (cannot be used for cropland). And meat animals use less resources per pound of protein that vegetable sources. Certainly less plowing. I'm always stunned by the idea that somehow raising millions of cattle is destroying the planet, yet the millions of buffalo that roamed the prairie before we arrived were natural and therefor good.
- osense 8y ago
  > And meat animals use less resources per pound of protein that vegetable sources. What? There's literally hundreds of scientific articles out there that establish the opposite, e.g. [1] [1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding-meat-and-dairy-is-single-biggest-way-to-reduce-your-impact-on-earth https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding... Edit: Where do you think the protein in cattle comes from? Isn't it… plants? That the cattle eat? Once eaten, the cattle expend some energy to live and then we kill them for meat. By not eating animals, you cut out the middleman and waste less energy.
  - deialtrous 8y ago
    That premise is only accurate if you are planning to have everyone consume livestock feed. If that is the plan, then you shouldn't be fixating on beef, you should be going after almost all crops we grow, which produce just as few calories per acre as beef, and even lower protein per acre. Depending on where you draw the line, your argument effectively requires all farms to only grow a small number of very high calorie crops like field corn and potatoes.

osense 8y ago

I think you may be wrong here. Firstly, most cattle is not grazed on open pastures: "[…] the current pastureland grass resource can support only 27% of the current beef supply" [1] Rather, they are kept on feed imported most likely from South America, and "Agriculture is the direct driver for worldwide deforestation" [2]. So how does attempting to minimize deforestation not address the issue? [1] http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aad401 http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aad401 [2] https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/09/120925091608.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/09/120925091608.h...

deialtrous 8y ago
Literally all beef in Canada and the US is grazed on open pastures. The majority of it is sent to feed lots for the last couple of months of their life to be fattened on grain, but they spend the first year in pasture no matter what. Second, absolutely none of the feed is imported from South America. It is from Nebraska and Iowa in the US, and Alberta and Saskatchewan in Canada. Both nations produce massive amounts of grain, far more than needed to feed all the livestock we raise, much less just the cattle. Third, this is the point, it isn't attempting to minimize deforestation. My eating beef or not eating beef does absolutely nothing, as my beef did not cause any deforestation. My habits do not cause people half way around the world to change their behavior. And just as a note of interest, your first link is quite incorrect. It uses the lowest production pasture figure for its math rather than the average, it does not consider the idea that grass fed beef becoming a major industry might involve people switching to more productive grazing systems which we know produce at least double the calories per acre. It ignores the huge quantity of idle grassland we currently have which could be used for cattle production. And it neglects to factor in the millions of acres of corn and soy fields that would no longer be needed for cattle feed and can be converted to pasture. https://bovinepracticum.blogspot.com/2018/03/another-land-use-debate-feedlot.html https://bovinepracticum.blogspot.com/2018/03/another-land-us...
- osense 8y ago
  Thanks. I'm inclined to believe you on this as it seems reasonable, although I have to say that a blogpost is not the most trustworthy source of information :)