Is a Big Hunk of Steak Worth Almost 2,000 Gallons of Water?

Summer is heating up, and all the pools, barbeques, lawn-watering and the like that put our water use under the microscope, even more than it is the rest of the year. But did you know that we all have a 'water-footprint'?

Quite similar in concept to the carbon footprint, our water footprints are defined as "the total volume of freshwater that is used to produce the goods and services consumed by the individual, business or nation," by Waterfootprint.org. People use lots of water for drinking, cooking and washing, but even more for producing things such as food, paper, cotton clothes, etc. The numbers are staggering.

In the US, our water footprint is 2,500 cubic meters per capita, which translates roughly to 660,430 U.S. gallons per person per year. Compare that to 700 cubic meters per year per capita (184,920 gallons) in China and 1150 cubic meters per year per capita (303,798 gallons) in Japan. That's a lot of water down the drain at our hands.

This is apropos to Graham's discussion earlier today about knowing what it takes to "make" meat, and learning where it comes from; when you consider that it takes about 1,916 gallons of water to produce one pound of beef, it helps contextualize the impact of your meat-eating choices. Sure, we can all use less, buy less and consume less, which is easy to say and hard to do, but breaking it down and considering these numbers makes one simple food choice -- to eat less meat -- have much more gravity. I'm not in to guilt-tripping anyone into a greener lifestyle, but I encourage you to ask yourself this: Is having a big hunk of steak really worth almost 2,000 gallons of water? Let me know what you think in the comments.

More Water Footprint-related Reading from TreeHugger
Should Food Labelling Show Water Footprint ?
How to Green Your Water
Quick Quiz: How Much Water Do You Use Per Day?

Water Footprint Reading on Planet Green
Measure Your Food's Water Footprint
Calculate Your Water Footprint

Comments

[dapaul]

What about all the water used in agriculture? Have you ever seen a rice paddy? It's standing in water. That's why many rice producers have gone out of business, because of the amount of water required to produce the grain. Drought in various parts of the world has halted rice production. I am all for conservation. But the problem is that overpopulation in many parts of the world has led to total deforestation, which leads to drought and desert conditions. When are these "ecological" writers going to write about that?

[Henry]

It really is time to put the word "conservative" into a use consistent with its definition. We are decadent, wasteful, self absorbed, and disinterested.
If conservative really had traction (I mean from an example standpoint in living) then the conservatives would embrace environmentalists and they would not be a schizophrenic group with an identity crisis. They would be a brand name with a purpose, identity, an respect for the abidance by what they thought. Sad for conservatives.
The problem with beef is the problem with religion. You may know it as counter-productive, but it is part of our culture. Deer hunting once meant sustenance, it is now blood sport. The thrill of squeezing the trigger and extinguishing the life out of God's (pains me to say this) creatures can really only appeal to the disconnected.

[LiarLiarIraqsOnFire]

Mmmmm, steak!

[Mikie]

You seem to be suggesting that if we use less water in the US there would be more water in China or parts for the world that have less water. How does this work? If we don't use it here, it flows back into the ocean. It doesn't flow into other parts of the world that have less water.

Also while it may take 1916 gallons of water to produce 1 pound of beef (I would love to see a breakdown of this statistic) it doesn't mean that the water is somehow used up and gone from the world. This is not like oil, which when consumed is gone. The water cycle is a closed system, and while there is a finite amount of water in the world that amount doesn't change. Water gets transformed to different forms (liquid, vapor, solid) and moved around (oceans, lakes, rivers), but it isn't gone when it is used. That there is less water in other parts of the world is due to climatic conditions not because we in the US are using too much water.