this post was submitted on 09 Jan 2024
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I still think it's wild that people argue about what pet it is ok to eat. I mean, I didn't really quit meat to this day and I don't really care what animal it's from. I care whether it was sourced ethically, at least up to my standards. I mostly refuse meat because of the horrible impact on the climate and because I can't / don't want to afford ethically sourced meat all too often.
Actually, the impact on climate is very very little. If the whole US would go vegan it would only decrease the total carbon emissions of the US by a little over 2%, the methane emissions would stay the same.
I haven’t quit meat, in fact I love it, but I will never support ethically bad living conditions for the animals. I only buy buy meat from animals that live free roaming with access to stables, even though it’s expensive where I live (about $ 20 per pound of cutlet)
Where are you getting those numbers from? The EPA has agriculture at 10% of US green house gas emissions. A quarter of that (so close to your 2% number) is from methane emissions alone. If you stop farming animals you're also looking at reduced emissions from not using manure and growing less crops since you don't need to make feed.
https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/sources-greenhouse-gas-emissions#agriculture
And it's not just the greenhouse gas emissions. 1 oz of beef takes over 100 gallons of water to produce. In comparison broccoli takes about 2 gallons per oz. In terms of calories beef requires 7.25 times more water.
I don’t know anymore, sorry. It was some years ago in a study made by some German or Swiss scientists that was locked behind a paywall.
I’ll have a look at the sci-hub and drop the link if I’ll ever find it!
It was a very in-depth study also included mountainous regions where agriculture is not possible, the cows eat that grass and the waste of vegetables like husks and stems and stuff like that.