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Where are these emissions coming from? For instance, if this is counting the emissions involved in logistics, none of that inherently or necessarily requires gr
by philwelch 8mo ago
Where are these emissions coming from? For instance, if this is counting the emissions involved in logistics, none of that inherently or necessarily requires greenhouse emissions—you can electrify trains, tanker trucks, and refrigerators.
If this is counting the methane emissions of the cow itself, that’s not a fair or complete accounting. The cow produces methane in her digestive system after eating grass, and the grass grows by, among other things, extracting CO2 from the air. Then the cow burps methane, the methane combines with atmospheric oxygen and breaks down to CO2 and water, and you have a closed loop; the cow cannot belch more carbon than she eats, and that carbon came from the air in the first place.
- psjs 8mo agoMethane traps far more heat than CO2 before oxidizing back into it.
- philwelch 8mo agoThat doesn’t change the fact that you’re selectively counting only one side of a closed loop process. Methane may be a more efficient greenhouse gas than CO2 but if that effect dominated, we would expect to see the global warming trend start with the evolution of ruminants, not the Industrial Revolution (a time when the North American ruminant population actually declined a significant amount!)