Go Green by Eating More of Your Greens

A recent visit to the American Museum of Natural History in New York got me thinking: going vegetarian is probably the boldest step any of us can take to lead a greener life.

My mind kept returning to an amazing statistic from the new exhibit "Water: H2O = Life": 600 gallons of water are needed to produce a single hamburger. 600 gallons -- that's enough water to hydrate a person for over 3 years (at the recommended rate of 8 glasses per day). And that's just the beef patty--no bun or fixings included.

Full disclosure: I am not a vegetarian. I try to limit eating meat, but chicken, pork, and beef are all on my menu. Still, those water statistics got me thinking about the nexus of meat production and some of our most pressing ills, like food and water shortages, polluted oceans, land degradation, loss of habitats, and the big one, climate change. Believe it or not, producing our delicious meat has a part in all of these problems.

The way we produce meat today is very inefficient. Most animals raised for food in the United States are fed grain -- a lot of it. Each calorie of U.S.-produced beef requires about 7 calories of grains. For pork the caloric ratio is 1 to 4; for chicken it is 1 to 2.

It's a similar story with protein. Each pound of "high-quality animal protein" requires about 6 pounds of plant protein (American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 2003).

Here's the kicker -- U.S. livestock consume 7 times more grain than all Americans combined.

Needless to say, our meat-eating requires (literally) tons more grains than would, say, just eating the grain. This has enormous societal and environmental impacts. Let's look at just four.

The Food Crisis

Grabbing headlines lately are the skyrocketing prices for staples like corn and soybeans. High costs are squeezing people at the bottom of the income ladder, and malnutrition and starvation are on the rise in the developing world.

Clearly, eating meat did not precipitate this crisis. Nevertheless, because so much grain already goes to feeding livestock, when demands for grain increase for other purposes (say, for biofuels), the stage is set for today's problems. Somewhat ironically, the more we choose to eat grains over meat, the less demand there will be for grains and the more food there will be to feed people.

Water Shortages

Water is the life-blood of farming. In California and the American Southwest, irrigation is the circulatory system that waters the crops.

Irrigation uses about 40% of all freshwater withdrawals -- 137 billion gallons per day out of a total of 345 billion, according to government statistics. Irrigation is the largest single consumer of fresh water and can literally run rivers dry. Take the third longest river in the U.S. In theory, the Rio Grande drains into the Gulf of Mexico. But these days, it rarely reaches its mouth because over-extraction in part from irrigation dries it up before it gets there.

We'd use a lot less water if we ate less meat.

Water Pollution

Nitrogen is an essential building-block of life. Photosynthesis helps produce carbohydrates (molecules of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen), but to make protein (an amino acid) you need nitrogen. Farmers use lots of nitrogen fertilizer to increase grain yields.

By some estimates, U.S. croplands use almost 19 million tons of nitrogen (Howarth, Ambio 2002). Of that, only about 1.3 million tons feed people directly in the form of grains. Almost 6 million tons go to animals, and of that 6, a little less than 1 million ton is eaten by humans in the form of animal protein. The other 5 million tons fed to animals is pissed away -- or, ah, excreted through another path.

Suffice it to say, meat-eating significantly adds nitrogen to our environment - creating huge consequences. A lot of that nitrogen leaks into our rivers and our streams, degrading water quality and killing fish. It also drains into our oceans where it causes huge dead zones. Each year, pollution from the Mississippi River snuffs the life out of a slice of the Gulf of Mexico the size of New Jersey.

Climate Change

Farming takes energy. Sowing seeds, irrigating crops, producing and applying fertilizers, harvesting the crops and transporting them to market mean burning fossil fuels, which in turn means spewing copious emissions of carbon dioxide (C02), the major global warming pollutant.

What's more, cow "burps" add emissions of methane, a global warming pollutant about 20 times more powerful than CO2. And on top of that, applying nitrogen fertilizers leads to the production of nitrous oxide, a global warming pollutant about 120 times more potent than CO2.

The United Nations estimates that the livestock industry accounts for 18% of all global warming pollution -- more emissions than those coming from cars!

And so...

We have another "inconvenient truth." One of the most effective ways to slash global warming pollution and lead a more sustainable life is to skip that burger.

Now, I confessed earlier to my carnivorous habits, and am fully aware of how difficult giving up meat would be. I like my fries with a burger. But we can all cut back on meat.

I'll close with another stunning statistic. If every American gave up meat one day each week, it would be like taking 8 million cars off the road. Such a move would help fight a myriad of problems, such as climate change, water pollution and scarcity, and rising food prices. So who's game for meatless Mondays?

Huffington Post guest blogger Bill Chameides blogs regularly at thegreengrok.com

Follow Bill Chameides on Twitter: www.twitter.com/theGreenGrok

Comments

[DharamDev]

If human population control is the solution, as meat-addicts often propose, then stopping population growth at 6 or 7 billion will be totally inadequate. Haven’t folks noticed the rapid economic development in many very large countries? We would need to drop worldwide human population down to around 1 billion (and keep it there) to have any hope of sustainability.

How would that happen? A nice, big World War III, maybe with a few nuclear bombs? Or would it be preferable to hire mad scientists to produce a contagious, fatal disease to wipe out most of the world? I want to know the meat-eaters' plan for population control.

(Stopping agricultural subsidies would drastically reduce meat consumption. That's easy.)

The reality is that there is no remotely ethical way to reduce human population at a rate that would forestall disaster. The best we could do is to sterilize most of the public while waiting for people to die, but that would still be too slow, not to mention ethically abhorrent.

The sane alternative is to stop eating meat, especially to stop raising animals for meat. Since most animals have relatively short lifespans, this would naturally reduce livestock populations and drastically reduce our burden on the Earth fairly quickly. That would also solve our energy problem by drastically reducing the petroleum wasted on unnecessary agriculture and providing abundant farmland for biofuels.

[DharamDev]

Considering that I've been studying for more than fifteen years how a vegetarian diet could solve virtually all our environmental problems, how serious the situation is becoming, and the fact that I have important original insights to add, it would be nice if I could get one comment past the censors.

Maybe a vegetarian could be assigned as moderator for these discussions?

[Bill Chameides - Huffpost Blogger]

Cool. Meatless Mondays is apparently not that popular.
For some it's like eating cardboard all day, others it's a cop out to consumerism and over-indulgence.
Bottom line: eating meat is bad news for the environment.
Now, in the words of a Barbra Streisand impersonator, "discuss among yourselves."

PS. OK, sometimes even a dean needs to go to the museum to totally grok something.
And if you want to learn more about that go to www.thegreengrok.com

[dadw5boys]

If you eat seafood how much plastic is in it?

Was the fish you are eating once a Male fish but exposure to the chemicals in plastic forced tp to become Female.
Plastic dumped in the ocean break down smaller and smaller but never really goes away fish comsume it. Fish like Mantra Rays, Sperm Whales, star fish, flounder , all bottom fish and all the fish that eat them!

[1will]

Sounds good.
Get back to me when you make a carrot that tastes like a cheeseburger.

[dadw5boys]

They can make cardboard taste like a cheese burger too!!!!!!

[BillLumbergh]

what we don't need is portion control.
we need population control.

[BillLumbergh]

I'll probably eat 7 pounds of BBQ over the long weekend. Yum.

[Badbone]

Livestock accounts for more pollution than cars? So why do we have CAFE standards? Why the Kyoto protocols? And why is it always that "Americans" must be the ones to give up something? It seems we play a strange part in the global community. It's always us that must drive less, use less, eat less. Does no other country on earth eat meat? Nevermind. Use less, fellow American!

[Necron99]

You have your hands on the elephant's leg...but you are still insisting it's a tree trunk.

I suspect you know better. Most of the world lives on a dollar a day or less. Most of the world lives on beans or rice or something similar, and if they are lucky, maybe some chicken or similar sized creature (including, guinea pigs, dogs, rats, insects, anything that's got some protein in it).

We're using more energy, creating more pollution per capita than any other country by far. We spend more of our wealth on the MICC than all the other countries on earth put together.

& please, noby give me that 'but we're creating all this wealth that offsets that' crap. We're selling each other cheeseburgers.

India & China are creating products & we're paying for them. We are consumers. We are engines of consumption.

I'm comfortable here. But am I moral? Am I living a life that doesn't make the lives of other's on earth worse in the process?

You may be comfortable in your shoes, I'm not in mine.

[Badbone]

"Most of the world lives on beans or rice or something similar".

Yes, most of the people in the world live like cavemen. Are you suggesting that Americans should join them in the caves? After all, the caveman lifestyle doesn’t impact the environment much. It doesn’t use much energy. And it doesn’t negatively impact the lives of others.

Yes, America and the West (but not anyone else) should voluntarily give up all the progress we’ve made. Because not everyone else could pull themselves up, we should push ourselves down. Good idea, comrade.

[lamarguerite]

Yes, skip the burger, and also stop throwing food away, and eating more than is good for you!

http://lamarguerite.wordpress.com/2008/05/18/americans-waste-one-quarter-of-their-food/

[greenwriter]

Mr. Chameides, I respectfully ask, how as the Dean of the Nicholas School of the Environment at Duke University do you require a visit to a museum to learn widely known facts about the impact of meat production on the greatest crisis facing the environment today? Do you not get copies of the latest scientific data or UN reports? Second, having now learned the facts, how is your solution Meatless Mondays? Isn't that much akin to Hummer-free Mondays? If this is state of knowledge and solutions at the highest levels of our academia, we're much worse off than I thought.

[dadw5boys]

Check this out .

http://www.pinkyshow.org/archives/conversations/080225/

[enveg01]

The fact is that animal agriculture is the leading cause of greenhouse gases. The UN report, "Livestock's Long Shadow" documented this in great detail. Our meat consumption is wasteful, polluting, and ultimately destructive. The answer is not "meatless Mondays". As Bruce points out, its a great start but not nearly enough. I'm vegan and have never felt better in my life. There is such a vast array of amazing and healthy foods available to me. Just type vegan cooking into Google and feast your eyes. And if you live in almost any city in the US, you can find amazing vegan/vegetarian restaurants. Becoming vegan is one of the easiest things I've ever done and surely one of the best.

[Crowhaul]

Nice post, Bill. I went vegetarian because very few ppl I knew were standing up as protectors of the gentle folk. Those without voices. Those who endure a tortured life beyond anything we could imagine. So I joined PETA and gave up slaughtered animal as a staple. It was easy too. But, as you point out, there are lots of good reasons to give it up.

[vorpalmusic]

Do most people really eat meat every single day, with no exceptions? I consider myself not vegetarian at all, and I eat meat only about twice a week.

[BruceGFriedrich]

PART 2:
We know that a vegetarian diet is healthier than one that includes meat; the American Dietetic Association reviewed all the science on diet and concluded: “[V]egetarian diets are healthful, nutritionally adequate and provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases… Well-planned vegan and other types of vegetarian diets are appropriate for all stages of the life cycle, including during pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood and adolescence. Vegetarian diets offer a number of nutritional benefits, including lower levels of saturated fat, cholesterol, and animal protein as well as higher levels of carbohydrates, fiber, magnesium, potassium, folate, and antioxidants such as vitamins C and E and phytochemicals. Vegetarians have been reported to have lower body mass indices than nonvegetarians, as well as lower rates of death from ischemic heart disease; vegetarians also show lower blood cholesterol levels; lower blood pressure; and lower rates of hypertension, type 2 diabetes, and prostate and colon cancer.”

So how can environmentalists justify their decision to keep consuming a product that is so vastly inefficient, relative to a product that is even healthier for them?

Meatless Mondays is a great step, but can’t we can challenge ourselves to do a bit better?

Environmentalists wouldn’t argue that we should only take 2 hour showers 6 days a week, or only drive our Hummer 6 days a week, or only take transatlantic joy trips 6 days a week…

Eating meat seems to me like it belongs in the same category.

[BruceGFriedrich]

I have been a vegan for more than 20 years, since I read Diet for a Small Planet, which makes the same basic points in this article, thought with less science, since it was written so long ago.

What I don't understand, really, is why this statistic:
“If every American gave up meat one day each week, it would be like taking 8 million cars off the road. Such a move would help fight a myriad of problems, such as climate change, water pollution and scarcity, and rising food prices.”

doesn’t convince environmentalists to adopt at least a vegetarian diet, if not a vegan diet.

And according to Environmental Defense, "If every American skipped one meal of chicken per week and substituted vegetables and grains ... the carbon dioxide savings would be the same as taking more than half a million cars off of U.S. roads."

To me, as an environmentalist, this impact dictates that I eat chicken no days of the week, not six out of seven.

[greenwriter]

Spot on, as always, Bruce!