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Growing seaweed is significantly more expensive than growing cattle feed (i.e. corn), and corn farming is heavily subsidized by the US taxpayers. Corn fields al

by orev 4y ago

Growing seaweed is significantly more expensive than growing cattle feed (i.e. corn), and corn farming is heavily subsidized by the US taxpayers. Corn fields also have the advantage that they can be very close to the fields where cattle are, so you don’t need to transport the feed as far as you would from the ocean (which would itself emit CO2). The methane reduction benefits also happen when only a small portion of the feed is replaced with seaweed, so it’s not the whole diet that becomes seaweed.

myshpa 4y ago
> growing seaweed ... more expensive than growing cattle feed ... heavily subsidized by the US taxpayers ... corn fields have the advantage ... can be very close to the fields where cattle are a] there's no other food that's worse from the climate and environment standpoint than beef & dairy [0][1] b] transport is usually a tiny fraction of food's carbon footprint ... "eat local" is ruse & big ag propaganda [2] c] seaweed is more expensive than corn because of subsidies? so take those subsidies from one of the most destructive industries and give it to seaweed. even if it's expensive now, it's because we plant corn and not grow seaweed. if more people would grow seaweed, the price would go down. there's no reason why it should be expensive other than there is more demand than supply now. d] big cost of those corn fields and pastures is deforestation and land use change, a factor which is often undercounted and overlooked [1] e] about 70% of seaweed naturally sinks to the bottom of the sea ... so even if we wouldn't be able to eat and use it all, it still make sense to grow it [3] [0] https://ourworldindata.org/less-meat-or-sustainable-meat https://ourworldindata.org/less-meat-or-sustainable-meat [1] https://ourworldindata.org/land-use https://ourworldindata.org/land-use [2] https://ourworldindata.org/food-choice-vs-eating-local https://ourworldindata.org/food-choice-vs-eating-local [3] https://phys.org/news/2019-08-seaweed-deep-carbon.html https://phys.org/news/2019-08-seaweed-deep-carbon.html

by orev 4y ago

myshpa 4y ago

> growing seaweed ... more expensive than growing cattle feed ... heavily subsidized by the US taxpayers ... corn fields have the advantage ... can be very close to the fields where cattle are a] there's no other food that's worse from the climate and environment standpoint than beef & dairy [0][1] b] transport is usually a tiny fraction of food's carbon footprint ... "eat local" is ruse & big ag propaganda [2] c] seaweed is more expensive than corn because of subsidies? so take those subsidies from one of the most destructive industries and give it to seaweed. even if it's expensive now, it's because we plant corn and not grow seaweed. if more people would grow seaweed, the price would go down. there's no reason why it should be expensive other than there is more demand than supply now. d] big cost of those corn fields and pastures is deforestation and land use change, a factor which is often undercounted and overlooked [1] e] about 70% of seaweed naturally sinks to the bottom of the sea ... so even if we wouldn't be able to eat and use it all, it still make sense to grow it [3] [0] https://ourworldindata.org/less-meat-or-sustainable-meat https://ourworldindata.org/less-meat-or-sustainable-meat [1] https://ourworldindata.org/land-use https://ourworldindata.org/land-use [2] https://ourworldindata.org/food-choice-vs-eating-local https://ourworldindata.org/food-choice-vs-eating-local [3] https://phys.org/news/2019-08-seaweed-deep-carbon.html https://phys.org/news/2019-08-seaweed-deep-carbon.html