I consistently see posts from Vegans claiming how destructive animal agriculture is to the environment and how much of it is contributing to climate change. This video, Cowspiracy (cowspiracy/fact-check/). Touts many eye-opening statistics with regard to the environmental impact of animal agriculture (which I do not necessarily dispute); however, the conclusion that A person who follows a vegan diet uses 50% less carbon dioxide, 1/11th oil, 1/13th water, and 1/18th land compared to a meat-eater I find problematic as a) A humanity-wide shift to veganism is not remotely feasible b) The conclusions point to a possible pro-vegan bias c) If everyone were to convert to a vegan diet, there would have to be corresponding increase of protein rich legumes and the like to feed the billions of former meat-eaters. This type of farming would still require massive energy and water inputs in order to feed a population - how much better would this alternative be to the status-quo? How much better would this be than animal agriculture that uses methods to reduce energy and water consumption as well as GHG? I work in sustainability in commercial real estate, and its well known that the built environment is a MASSIVE contributor to GHG (25% here in San Francisco); however, what would be a feasible alternative to living and working in buildings? That is never the discussion, rather we focus on ways to be more energy efficient in existing building stock and require strict standards for efficiency and environmental impact for new construction. I welcome your thoughts and opinion on this matter.
Posted on: Wed, 01 Oct 2014 20:22:39 +0000
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