What Farts and Burps Have to Do with Global Warming

Due to their flatulence (farts) and eructation (burps), U.S. cattle put out 20% of U.S. methane emissions every year, about 5.5 million metric tons! Yes, rearing cattle produces more greenhouse gasses than cars, says a UN report. That makes livestock a major threat to the environment. Their gasses are only a small part of the problem. A complete report would also consider their land usage, the impact of grazing, global water use, deforestation, factory farms….the list goes on.

Headline: UN says eat less meat to curb global warming

Pardon the pun, but you don’t have to go “cold turkey,” giving up meat entirely, to make a global difference. Simply reducing the demand for meat will reduce the need for raising livestock (and their gaseous by-products). We just have to cut back.

Example: If you usually put 12,000 miles on your car each year, merely switching from eating red meat to chicken, fish, eggs just one day a week is like driving 760 miles less each year. If you’d switch to a vegetarian diet that one day-voila-you’ve saved the equivalent of driving 1,160 fewer miles.

And it is even easier to kick it up a notch. By eliminating red meat and dairy completely, you’ve cancelled out 5,340 miles of driving a year. By going vegetarian, you’ve just cut your emissions by over 60%. It is like driving only 3,900 miles instead of the 12,000 miles we started with.

Cutting back on the size of meat portions we eat will have an impact, too. If we each ate the equivalent of three fewer cheeseburgers a week, claims Mark Bittman in Food Matters, we’d cancel out the effects of all the SUVs in the United States. Bittman also provided the statistics given in the previous two paragraphs.

“How can one person make a difference?” good people sometimes cry out in despair when they reflect on our wounded planet.

That answer is easy. Eat less red meat.

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