[Newsbot]

Title: Eating less beef key to meeting EU climate targets: study
Category: Environmental
Posted By: DrCaleb
Date: 2016-02-23 06:45:17
Canadian

[andyt]

Why only EU targets? Surely this is a global thing.

This is where climate change becomes problematic for me. Reducing direct energy usage, fine. But not eating beef - no way.

[DrCaleb]

andyt andyt:

Why only EU targets? Surely this is a global thing.

This is where climate change becomes problematic for me. Reducing direct energy usage, fine. But not eating beef - no way.

The EU sets it's targets for itself. Besides, most of the work already doesn't eat beef and the part that does is starting to realize the impact on the environment it takes to produce beef.

And how is reducing your direct carbon usage not accomplished by reducing carbon intensive things like eating meat?

[andyt]

Because beef tastes good and I don't want to give it up.

A lot of the world eats lamb, which has the same problem. I can't stand it myself, so I'll happily give up lamb, continue eating beef.

[DrCaleb]

I love lamb.

It's the ethical dilemma that keeps me from eating it.

[martin14]

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

And how is reducing your direct carbon usage not accomplished by reducing carbon intensive things like eating meat?

Had a BBQ on the weekend, so don't worry, I'll get those emissions back up soon.

Secondly, have completed stage 1 on trying to rescue the outdoor grill on the property;
thinking wood fired pizza oven.


The government loves veggie munching herbivores, much easier to control.

Fuck the EU.

[Lemmy]

What if I buy my beef from my local hippie? He feeds them the barley he grows, all natural. He's too cheap to use hormones or any fertilizers, so his product is organic in everything but name/label. The beasts are butchered locally and there you go. You can have your beef and eat it too, just go meet a local farmer and stay out of the meat aisle at the grocery.

[andyt]

Lemmy Lemmy:

What if I buy my beef from my local hippie? He feeds them the barley he grows, all natural. He's too cheap to use hormones or any fertilizers, so his product is organic in everything but name/label. The beasts are butchered locally and there you go. You can have your beef and eat it too, just go meet a local farmer and stay out of the meat aisle at the grocery.

What does that have to do with global warming. They're still farting methane, and are still very inefficient at converting their food to meat.

[DrCaleb]

Lemmy Lemmy:

What if I buy my beef from my local hippie? He feeds them the barley he grows, all natural. He's too cheap to use hormones or any fertilizers, so his product is organic in everything but name/label. The beasts are butchered locally and there you go. You can have your beef and eat it too, just go meet a local farmer and stay out of the meat aisle at the grocery.

Trying to find that hippie is tough. I get my eggs and bacon from Hutterites at the farmers market. Sometimes a chicken, if I'm feeling rich. It's pretty much the only meat I eat, Sunday mornings. Sometimes there are Bison or Elk farmers at the market too, but that meat is too pricey to be eating every day.

I much prefer meat that came from an animal that's only had one bad day.

[DrCaleb]

andyt andyt:

Lemmy Lemmy:

What if I buy my beef from my local hippie? He feeds them the barley he grows, all natural. He's too cheap to use hormones or any fertilizers, so his product is organic in everything but name/label. The beasts are butchered locally and there you go. You can have your beef and eat it too, just go meet a local farmer and stay out of the meat aisle at the grocery.

What does that have to do with global warming. They're still farting methane, and are still very inefficient at converting their food to meat.

It's not the methane production that is the problem (although it's significant), it's the rainforest (or boreal forest) that gets cleared to grow the soy or corn that gets turned into feed for an animal that evolved to eat grass. It's the petrochemical fertilizers, herbicides and insecticides that get sprayed on those crops that wash away into the rivers and kill marine life once that river meets the sea, and wipe out bees that are needed to pollinate those and other crops.

And grass fed beef is so much tastier!

[andyt]

grass fed beef is pretty humane.

[DrCaleb]

andyt andyt:

grass fed beef is pretty humane.

Exactly. And corn fed beef is obese.

[andyt]

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

andyt andyt:

Lemmy Lemmy:

What if I buy my beef from my local hippie? He feeds them the barley he grows, all natural. He's too cheap to use hormones or any fertilizers, so his product is organic in everything but name/label. The beasts are butchered locally and there you go. You can have your beef and eat it too, just go meet a local farmer and stay out of the meat aisle at the grocery.

What does that have to do with global warming. They're still farting methane, and are still very inefficient at converting their food to meat.

It's not the methane production that is the problem (although it's significant), it's the rainforest (or boreal forest) that gets cleared to grow the soy or corn that gets turned into feed for an animal that evolved to eat grass. It's the petrochemical fertilizers, herbicides and insecticides that get sprayed on those crops that wash away into the rivers and kill marine life once that river meets the sea, and wipe out bees that are needed to pollinate those and other crops.

And grass fed beef is so much tastier!

Well, then we can keep eating beef in Canada, since we're not wiping out any forest to grow beef. And even corn/soy finished beef eats grass for most of its lifespan.

The articles I read specifically said ruminants are the problem - ie their methane production.

[BartSimpson]

I'm going to keep eating meat. The climate weenies can go fuck themselves.

[DrCaleb]

andyt andyt:

Well, then we can keep eating beef in Canada, since we're not wiping out any forest to grow beef. And even corn/soy finished beef eats grass for most of its lifespan.

The articles I read specifically said ruminants are the problem - ie their methane production.

You've never seen a feed lot? Cows spend up to half their lifetime in crowded pens eating corn or soy to make them fat.

It's not pretty.

And methane is a much stronger greenhouse gas than Carbon Dioxide, but the amount of forest and land lost - not to mention environmental damage - is far more than the damage methane does.

http://science.time.com/2013/12/16/the- ... roduction/