People who eat animal-sourced foods to maintain their metabolic health are equicapable and equiresponsible for mitigating climate change.
Calculating carbon footprint
It’s very difficult, if not impossible, to accurately calculate one’s carbon footprint, because of the different assumptions made about lifestyle in each model.
I’ve purchased offsets through the United Nations so I’m using their calculator as a baseline. A more comprehensive calculator with good documentation developed at UC Berkeley is also available (see references).
Diet
Estimations of animal sourced food vs a vegan diet seem to range between increase in emissions by 0.8 – 2 metric tons of carbon emissions/person/year. The UN model adds 1.21 tons for a meat-inclusive diet so that’s what’s I went with.
I may follow-up with a post that goes into more detail about my calculations here. In the meantime:
- Animal sourced food diets emit more carbon than vegan ones, the question is by what margin
- I am aware of the literature around regenerative agriculture and other approaches; my understanding is that these are still in the theoretical stage – if anyone has better information, send my way.
- Models I’ve found are typically based on the Standard American Diet (SAD) and not low carbohydrate, healthy fat, real food (LCHF) approaches
- They include snacking, refined grains, and artificial foods, and do not incorporate impacts of greater health care use from these things
- They assess food source based on carbon emissions per kcal, which has implications based on nutrient density, amount of food required for nourishment and associated carbon costs (packaging, transport, etc etc).
Goods and services, including health care
- The UN calculator does not incorporate emissions from goods and services, including health care. The CoolClimate Network calculator out of UC Berkeley does make an attempt at this.
- A separate calculation for a non-diabetic shows 1.99 less metric tons/year, based on pharmaceuticals only
- You can access impact of pharmaceuticals in this blog post: Just Read: Carbon footprint of the global pharmaceutical industry – “Significantly worse than the automotive industry”
Here’s that image, again.
Energy – source of greatest emissions
- Not owning a car reduces emissions by 2.51 metric tons / year
- Household energy use and air travel are significant contributors to the carbon footprint
The much greater impact overall is in large organizations doing this at scale – reducing fossil fuel use and investing in renewable energy and regenerative agriculture projects.
Overall footprint, carbon offsets
The greatest impact on carbon footprint is in managing energy use, and that includes energy used for transportation as well as to create goods and services whose use could be averted (such as health care).
The much greater impact overall is in large organizations doing this at scale – reducing fossil fuel use and investing in renewable energy and regenerative agriculture projects.
I don't eat meat, for several reasons. But I am concerned about crap arguments that hopelessly exaggerate the carbon emissions associated with eating meat.
Science matters. Getting the facts right matter. Regardless of your opinions.
This thread: https://t.co/1GfE83lmU6 https://t.co/uUcuqkmEFx— Michael E. Mann (@MichaelEMann) July 17, 2018
I have purchased carbon offsets for the footprint above – see: Purchasing Carbon Offsets as a non-diabetic physician on an LCHF diet – How, What, Why
Our climate is changing:
And, we’re in the era of diabetes reversal, why don’t more doctors know?
Feel free to check my work in the comments, we have a desire to know rather than a desire to be right.
References
- United Nations: offset.climateneutralnow.org
- CoolClimate Network: coolclimate.org/calculator
- Jones CM, Kammen DM. Quantifying Carbon Footprint Reduction Opportunities for U.S. Households and Communities. Environ Sci Technol [Internet]. 2011 May [cited 2019 Oct 3];45(9):4088–95. Available from: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/es102221h
Disclosures
See my disclosures page. Short version: I have none.