3 ms·

Meat has been highly produced because the gov’t of Nixon’s era and today’s era has been buying up tons of bushels of grain(1). The gov’t bought grain to help su

Meat has been highly produced because the gov’t of Nixon’s era and today’s era has been buying up tons of bushels of grain(1). The gov’t bought grain to help support & subsidize farmers and ranchers. Grain is convenient to offload as cattle feed. Cheap cattle feed encourages raising cattle. Cow farts contribute over 40% of the world’s methane(2). Methane contributes 34 times more towards global warming per unit than carbon dioxide. Thus if we want to tackle climate change, we should rethink our Cold War era grain subsidies and ultimately reduce our dependence on cattle. Sources: (1) Freakonomics Radio Podcast (2) Earth and Space Science Honors course

seanmcdirmid 7y ago
> Cow farts contribute over 40% of the world’s methane. Methane contributes 34 times more towards global warming per unit than carbon dioxide. How many total units of methane are there vs. total units of CO2? Otherwise, I can’t make a value judgement about the impact of cows on global warming.
- webninja 7y ago
  I used to link to the EPA but I learned this week that they might be a captured agency(1). They used to have a website section devoted to methane, it’s sources, and it’s contribution but it’s either been taken down or I simply can’t find it. However, Bill Gates writes in his blog that Agriculture contributes towards 24% of the world’s climate change and that “Cattle are a huge source of methane; in fact, if they were a country, they would be the third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases!”(2). His blog post that I link to below is admittedly a secondary source but I think he does a pretty good job at showing the big picture. Sources: (1)https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture (2)https://www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/My-plan-for-fighting-climate-change https://www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/My-plan-for-fighting-clima... If you go on to find a good (hopefully primary) source, please reply with it here!

seanmcdirmid 7y ago

> Cow farts contribute over 40% of the world’s methane. Methane contributes 34 times more towards global warming per unit than carbon dioxide. How many total units of methane are there vs. total units of CO2? Otherwise, I can’t make a value judgement about the impact of cows on global warming.

webninja 7y ago
I used to link to the EPA but I learned this week that they might be a captured agency(1). They used to have a website section devoted to methane, it’s sources, and it’s contribution but it’s either been taken down or I simply can’t find it. However, Bill Gates writes in his blog that Agriculture contributes towards 24% of the world’s climate change and that “Cattle are a huge source of methane; in fact, if they were a country, they would be the third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases!”(2). His blog post that I link to below is admittedly a secondary source but I think he does a pretty good job at showing the big picture. Sources: (1)https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture (2)https://www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/My-plan-for-fighting-climate-change https://www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/My-plan-for-fighting-clima... If you go on to find a good (hopefully primary) source, please reply with it here!