Meat and methane

[Curiouso]

I'm curious about the argument that meat eating is bad for the environment. I've been reading a bit about it and still a bit lost.
Is it industrial farming that causes the problem?
I read about the meat industry causing the amazon rain forest to be destroyed. But what about local butchers who sell meat from local farms which keep their animals outdoors? Is that bad for the environment?

How does meat production compare with artificial vegan food? They seem to be ultra processed food, which by all accounts is not good for us to eat, is heavily packaged, and I imagine that also has a big environmental impact.
What about people keeping horses? Is it only eating the animals that is a problem, or is it their existence that is impacting climate change?
The arguments about the ethics of being non-vegan aside ( so only about the environmental impact) are we attempting to rid the planet of animals or just stop eating them?
The way I understand it, we need manure to fertilise the land to maintain decent topsoil, so is it even possible to constantly grow food crops in areas traditionally used for grazing?
And what about the areas where crops can't be grown that are traditionally used for grazing animals?
Basically is meat always bad for the environment or is it the way it is produced in vast quantities the problem?

Sorry lots of questions, but I've been puzzling over this quite a lot!

I have / had lots of questions too. This documentary put out a while ago was good and answered a lot of mine!

www.channel4.com/programmes/apocalypse-cow-how-meat-killed-the-planet

One thing I hadn't really thought about was how much land is required to grow the food needed to feed the livestock and the work / pollution that goes into that side of it.

Well firstly you can’t really compare apples with oranges- a plant based whole foods diet is different from one which relies wholly on packaged and processed foods.

But yes, environmentally local meat is worse for the environment than even imported plants.

pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/es702969f

“buying local” could achieve, at maximum, around a 4−5% reduction in GHG emissions due to large sources of both CO2 and non-CO2 emissions in the production of food. Shifting less than 1 day per week’s (i.e., 1/7 of total calories) consumption of red meat and/or dairy to other protein sources or a vegetable-based diet could have the same climate impact as buying all household food from local providers.”

www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/10/181023110627.htm

“A new study provides a more comprehensive accounting of the greenhouse gas emissions from EU diets. It shows that meat and dairy products are responsible for the lion's share of greenhouse emissions from the EU diet.”

“The study found that meat and dairy account for more than 75% of the impact from EU diets. That's because meat and dairy production causes not only direct emissions from animal production, but also contributes to deforestation from cropland expansion for feed, which is often produced outside of the EU.”

“"People tend to think that consuming locally will be the solution to climate change, but it turns out that the type of product we eat is much more important for the overall impact," says IIASA researcher Hugo Valin, a study coauthor and Sandström's YSSP advisor. "Europeans are culturally attached to meat and dairy product consumption.”

Most of the soya imported into the U.K. from the Amazon is fed to animals:

www.wwf.org.uk/sites/default/files/2017-10/WWF_AppetiteForDestruction_Summary_Report_SignOff.pdf

“Today, protein-rich soy is such an important feed ingredient that the average European consumes approximately 61kg of soy per year, largely indirectly through the animal products that they eat like chicken, pork, salmon, cheese, milk and eggs. In 2010, the British livestock industry needed an area the size of Yorkshire to produce the soy used in feed. And if the global demand for animal products grows as anticipated, it’s estimated that soy production would need to increase by nearly 80% to feed all the animals destined for our plates.”

But even purely grass fed animals are problematic:

www.tabledebates.org/node/12335

This report finds that better management of grass-fed livestock, while worthwhile in and of itself, does not offer a significant solution to climate change as only under very specific conditions can they help sequester carbon. This sequestering of carbon is even then small, time-limited, reversible and substantially outweighed by the greenhouse gas emissions these grazing animals generate. The report concludes that although there can be other benefits to grazing livestock - solving climate change isn’t one of them.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.independent.ie/business/farming/forestry-enviro/blow-for-grass-fed-beef-as-new-report-suggests-its-part-of-the-climate-problem-not-solution-36209259.html

But at an aggregate level the emissions generated by these grazing systems still outweigh the removals and even assuming improvements in productivity, they simply cannot supply us with all the animal protein we currently eat. They are even less able to provide us with the quantities of meat and milk that our growing and increasingly more affluent population apparently wants to consume. Significant expansion in overall numbers would cause catastrophic land use change and other environmental damage. This is especially the case if one adopts a very ‘pure’ definition of a grazing system, the sort that grazing advocates tend to portray, where livestock are reared year-round on grass that is not fertilised with mineral fertilisers, receiving no additional nutritional supplementation, and at stocking densities that support environmental goals.

link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-020-02673-x

“Grazing systems emit greenhouse gases, which can, under specific agro-ecological conditions, be partly or entirely offset by soil carbon sequestration. However, any sequestration is time-limited, reversible, and at a global level outweighed by emissions from grazing systems. Thus, grazing systems are globally a net contributor to climate change.”

Here are a few answers:

Re industrial farming: all animals (and humans) will fart and produce methane, not to mention a certain amount of CO2. I think ruminants, (ie cows) are particularly bad in terms of methane production, this would include any cows, regardless of industrial production or otherwise. Even if raised indoors, where do you think the methane all goes eventually?

Artificial vegan food vs meat: A key point to bear in mind here is that artificial vegan food is, by definition, plant-based. It comes out of the ground (mostly, but with a few exception), is processed and eaten. With animals, the animal eats plant-based food (usually) and uses some of the energy from its food for growth. A lot more is spent on moving around, reproducing, staying warm, breathing etc, hence in terms of energy consumed, and therefore the overall CO2 footprint, vegan food will always be better. Not all of it is good however, vegan food from a sustainable source is the ideal option (ie not Soya from rainforest land).

Re manure (or lack thereof): This is a somewhat outdated view. Yes, fields can be fertilised using manure and this seems sustainable. However, where manure is unavailable, you can also convert NO2 (from air) into ammonia to use in fertiliser for the same purpose. This is perfectly safe and does not involve livestock. The energy involved is also probably lower.

Re: areas traditionally used for grazing animals: many of these would ultimately revert to forest, where wild animals could live, albeit at a much lower density.

I hope this helps and I don't sound like a ranty vegan. I'm not (although I used to work with one). I tend to pursue a low-meat/animal products strategy. There are some easy substitutions to make that save a surprising amoung of CO2 - for example I recently switched from cow to oat milk: 7l of oat milk generates about the same as 1l of cow's milk. Otherwise, I try to avoid red meat and occasionally have chicken. Cheese I struggle to live without or replace.

OK, thank you, that's helpful and I will follow those links.
Can anyone answer my question about horses? It sounds like they should probably go too, as they eat concentrate food as well.
I wasn't comparing meat diet to only artificial food ( though it reads as though I was) I was really just wondering how the air miles and packaging compared I suppose.
I can't help feeling that the biggest problem is trying to get the ever increasing world population fed without industrial farming. I wonder how long its been that our diet has impacted on climate? Presumably the hunters and gatherers ( and occasional mammoth hunters) left a much lower footprint.
The vast swathes of land used to grow wheat and soya are very unnatural. I guess we all eat too much of everything really.
As more of us become vegan, what are the aims regarding animal keeping long term, does anyone know? How will grassland areas be maintained? Purely by wild grazing animals? Do they damage the planet?

Sorry, this is really long! I am a scientist, and although this is not completely my area, I do know a bit about it, but perhaps others will come along to fill in some of the detail.

All cows produce methane. Doesn't matter if they're indoors in factory farms or living a life of luxury in a grassy field somewhere. I should also add, that my understanding is that cows emit more methane than other animals because they are ruminants. So ruminants tend to have higher methane emissions related to their digestion than other animals.

However, the production of feed for cows who are not outdoors in fields also produces methane. So in that sense, there might be less methane associated with cows grazing outdoors. But (and this is why it's complicated), it also depends on what else you could/would use the land for, if it didn't have cows on it. If you keep cows indoor and use the land for soy production for cattle feed, then that's bad. But if you keep cows inside and instead reforest the land, then that's not as bad.

A large portion of emissions from meat and dairy production emerge from farms. For dairy, about 70-80% of emissions are farm-based. About 10% is related to processing (pasteurising, turning it into cheese, butter, etc.). It is much easier to reduce these emissions related to processing, through electrification, use of renewable energy, energy efficiency, etcetera. While producing processed vegan food will produce emissions, it's very unlikely to be the same amount as the emissions produced by animal farming, as factories by and large are quite efficient.

One of the main issues is that we're a long way away from 'circular farming'. Instead we are both reliant on artificial feed and there is an overproduction of manure in many places, which creates other problems related to phosphorus and nitrates. So, reducing the amount of livestock would be a great start.

The final thing is that environmental issues are complex. If you look at emissions in isolation it might make sense to say we should halt livestock production completely, but if you look at other environmental dimensions (various types of land use), social/economic/food dimensions (needing to produce enough food) then it becomes a much more complex picture, and halting all livestock production is probably not the way to go. I do think from a holistic environmental & health perspective reducing livestock /animal farming is probably the way forward, which would allow for a more circular model, not reliant on alternative feedstock or the disposal of manure in far away places.

Yes, horses and pets generally will need to go. Basically any animal that isn't strictly necessary will need to be phased out. Working horses such as police or race horses are fine because they serve a useful purpose. But ones kept as pets, just used for "riding" or show-jumping will be got rid of.

Wild animals will still be allowed but numbers will be carefully managed, there will be culls to ensure that the numbers don't get too high.

On the wider point, remember that vegan food is very energy and resource intensive. Until there is a reliable source of unlimited clean energy, such as if/when nuclear fusion becomes viable, a vegan diet is just as damaging to the planet as a normal diet. Yes, culling all cows will reduce global methane emissions, but for every problem "solved" by a vegan diet countless others are created.

Ha, I see the knowledgeable folk are out in force today! To answer your airmiles question: transport makes up about 5% of food's emissions (and I think that % also includes people driving to the supermarket to buy food). So, it's not really a big contributor.

For clarity, I'm currently eating reduced meat diet days a oyple of days a week, avoiding ultra processd food as far as possible, not yet given up dairy though don't consume a lot but I love cheese on a jacket potato. I eat eggs,and a lot of plants.
I've just been pondering a lot of questions in my head about the environmental impact of it all.
Topsoil is my other concern - are there clever farming strategies to maintain decent growing conditions without rotating with grazing animals?
Seriously this is not a passive aggressive pro meat/anti vegan thread, I am genuinely trying to get my head around it all

Hi @curiouso
There are lots of good questions in your OP so I hope I can offer so helpful answers. Threads in this theme often become polarised, fact-free shouting matches though so watch out!

Firstly, it isnt just an issue of industrial versus "traditional" agriculture. There are many different types of animal agriculture on a scale from regenerative to industrial, and the issues are more complex than simply methane production (although this is one issue!)

The first problem is that we do not have enough land mass to support the consumption of animals for our expanding world population. Producing animals is a less efficient way to produce calories for human consumption. Simply put, growing a cow takes up much more land than growing the equivalent calories in crops if we just ate the crops directly. The land that gets used for this has value ecologically, so the more land we need to produce food, the less land available for wildlife. Land isnt just valuable for food production, so even using marginal "unproductive" land for animals because it cant be used for crops is very damaging at scale because we are losing value habitats which support wildlife and provide other ecosystem services such as flood prevention, carbon storage, pollination, clean air etc.

The second issue is that we have a very romantised view of "traditional" agriculture, but the reality is that the majority of agriculture culture is now in some ways industrialized when you take into account, transport, barning animals over winter and importing feed. So locally produced, butcher-bought beef is better but it's not great because many british animals are still fed corn or soya at least some of the time - much of which is grown on deforested areas abroad. The excess of poo from animals raised like this does benefit the land, it raises the nutrients to unnatural levels and pollutes our rivers. If you want to support genuinely benefitial meat you need to look for "conservation grazed" "permanent pasture" and "regenerative farming" and ideally buy direct from producers. Also it is again an issue of scale. We would produce FAR less animals if they were all raised in this way, so everyone needs to reduce their animal consumption overall.

Food miles and packaging are a bit of red herring, because although they are issues that shouldn't be ignored, by far the biggest carbon and ecological impact of food comes from the production. So no one is arguing that a heavily processed and packaged vegan diet is good, but if you actually look at the data in most cases it will still be less carbon intensive than a diet high in meat consumption.

I will try to find some helpful links for you but in the meantime I would recommend looking up the planet diet. It's not necessarily about becoming vegan but we all need to reset our expectations about how much animal products we consume.

Horses will contribute to climate change as they will need to be fed and they produce methane (but less than cows as they are not ruminants).

There are however only an estimated 847,000 horses in the U.K. compared to an estimated 9.4 million cows. Globally it’s estimated there are 58 million domestic horses compared with 1.5 billion cows. So their impact is going to be far less.

Pets in general are however a contributor to climate change and not having pets is according to this study the 25th ranked action that one can take to reduce personal contribution to climate change (a plant based diet is the 6th) www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2021-04/Environmental%20Perils%20of%20Perception%202021_0.pdf

Thank you all. I appreciate all your responses and will delve a bit deeper.
Slightly concerned about horses and pets needing to go and culling of wild animals.
If those are genuinely being considered I think we will need to watch out for an even greater imbalance of nature than we have already. But then it's the human desire to domesticate other species that has caused our problems really

It's complicated!

So in order to tackle climate change we will need to kill animals ? Did I read that correctly ?

@namechanger2222

So in order to tackle climate change we will need to kill animals ? Did I read that correctly ?

Only according to one poster. I'm wondering if culling humans is the way forward. Planet would be in a much better state without us.

Strategies for farming and maintaining soil conditions without grazing animals:

veganorganic.net/growing-with-grace-fertile-soil/

A lot more work will need to be done on this.

@Curiouso: i'm not sure grazing rotations are strictly needed to maintain topsoil quality: growing certain plants (such as legumes) occasionally will help with this.

Also don't overlook the power of new technologies here, for example we can genetically modify yeast to produce flour, proteins and most other staple foods and grow them in vats (known as fermenters) in factories. These take up a lot less space than fields and with the help of solar energy can even be made using a carbon-neutral manufacturing process.

See: www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/08/lab-grown-food-destroy-farming-save-planet

And for those who are feeling uncomfortable about genetic engineering, remember that quite a few medicines and foodstuffs are already made in this way (and are safe), for example: insulin for diabetics, most of the enzymes used for vegetarian cheeses, and finings for commercially made beers and juices

Actually, re reading the post in question, phased out not killed, in re horses and pets anyway.
Culling wild animals sounds a bit harsh.

@MorningStarling

Yes, horses and pets generally will need to go. Basically any animal that isn't strictly necessary will need to be phased out. Working horses such as police or race horses are fine because they serve a useful purpose. But ones kept as pets, just used for "riding" or show-jumping will be got rid of.

Wild animals will still be allowed but numbers will be carefully managed, there will be culls to ensure that the numbers don't get too high.

On the wider point, remember that vegan food is very energy and resource intensive. Until there is a reliable source of unlimited clean energy, such as if/when nuclear fusion becomes viable, a vegan diet is just as damaging to the planet as a normal diet. Yes, culling all cows will reduce global methane emissions, but for every problem "solved" by a vegan diet countless others are created.

I think we'd be far better off reducing the human population from an environmental prospective than 'phasing out' animals that aren't considered useful by some. Pets can have a huge impact on mental health especially for the elderly, those with SEN, people with depression, people who are lonely etc etc They're certainly more useful than race horses which don't do any kind of useful job apart from potentially make their owners very rich and are often treated badly and got rid of as soon as they're no longer useful.

@MorningStarling

Yes, horses and pets generally will need to go. Basically any animal that isn't strictly necessary will need to be phased out. Working horses such as police or race horses are fine because they serve a useful purpose. But ones kept as pets, just used for "riding" or show-jumping will be got rid of.

Wild animals will still be allowed but numbers will be carefully managed, there will be culls to ensure that the numbers don't get too high.

On the wider point, remember that vegan food is very energy and resource intensive. Until there is a reliable source of unlimited clean energy, such as if/when nuclear fusion becomes viable, a vegan diet is just as damaging to the planet as a normal diet. Yes, culling all cows will reduce global methane emissions, but for every problem "solved" by a vegan diet countless others are created.

It's simply bollocks to say that vegan food is intrinsically as damaging to the environment as meat eating.

You could grow soya or wheat, turn it into nutritious pellets, ship it across the globe, feed it to a calf/chick/piglet, keep that animal warm and dry and watered, carry on feeding it every day until it's large enough to be carried to slaughter, process it and turn it into a burger, and then ship it to a shop to feed to a human. Or you could ship the nutritious soya/wheat direct to a shop to feed a human and cut out an enormous chunk of the emissions in the process. With the exception of a tiny quantity of chickens fed on scraps and grass fed mountain sheep, industrial meat production involves using land to grow fodder which is then fed to animals which is a hugely inefficient use of calorie value.

[quote TheWhalrus]@Curiouso: i'm not sure grazing rotations are strictly needed to maintain topsoil quality: growing certain plants (such as legumes) occasionally will help with this.

Also don't overlook the power of new technologies here, for example we can genetically modify yeast to produce flour, proteins and most other staple foods and grow them in vats (known as fermenters) in factories. These take up a lot less space than fields and with the help of solar energy can even be made using a carbon-neutral manufacturing process.

See: www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/08/lab-grown-food-destroy-farming-save-planet

And for those who are feeling uncomfortable about genetic engineering, remember that quite a few medicines and foodstuffs are already made in this way (and are safe), for example: insulin for diabetics, most of the enzymes used for vegetarian cheeses, and finings for commercially made beers and juices[/quote]
So ultimately we are looking at a highly unnatural lifestyle all round aren't we?
I wonder what it's going to do to our health long term.
It's a very interesting discussion and I very much appreciate all the info.

@PassingByAndThoughtIdDropIn that's quite a thought.
It does really take me back to thinking this is not how it was meant to be.
With fewer people on the planet, meat production would not be as you describe. It would be a much more natural process.
(I'm not disputing that this is how it is now)
I am quite alarmed at what we've become, if I'm honest. That we do everything in such an unnatural manner in order to feed our ever increasing population.
I think the rot set in when the hunter gatherers first began growing their own!
I wonder how this will end.

Actually @MorningStarling I think I agree with you that for every problem 'solved' by a vegan diet, countless others are created.
There seem to be problems whichever way we turn. It's all academic because some people will go vegan/plant based, and others won't. I'm certain that we all need to reduce our consumption of all the things, but that will negatively impact on the economy.
Crikey I'm depressing myself now

@namechanger2222

So in order to tackle climate change we will need to kill animals ? Did I read that correctly ?

I'm guessing they mean don't breed anymore or breed limited numbers.

[quote Curiouso]@PassingByAndThoughtIdDropIn that's quite a thought.
It does really take me back to thinking this is not how it was meant to be.
With fewer people on the planet, meat production would not be as you describe. It would be a much more natural process.
(I'm not disputing that this is how it is now)
I am quite alarmed at what we've become, if I'm honest. That we do everything in such an unnatural manner in order to feed our ever increasing population.
I think the rot set in when the hunter gatherers first began growing their own!
I wonder how this will end.[/quote]
@Curiouso I would argue that unnatural lifestyles have ever been thus. For example, the current global population basically would never have been possible without this artificial chemical process that acts as the source of most of our fertilizer (see the part economic an environmental aspects in particular) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process#Economic_and_environmental_aspects

i think the key now is to manipulate natural processes in ways that do not destroy the earth.