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MONTH: May 2007

Greenhouse gases are invisible--
as is "green" recognition of meat
as source

NORWALK, Connecticut-- Posting "Ten easy steps to cutting out the #1 contributor to global warming: farmed animals!" on April 6, 2007, the Earth Day Network could not have been more explicit about the most helpful action that average citizens can take to cut greenhouse gas emissions and slow the pace of climate change. But the Earth Day Network message barely reached the celebrants.

Among more than 8.9 million web postings worldwide about Earth Day 2007, 26% mentioned food, mostly as a component of festivities. Only 1% mentioned "livestock," "cattle," "vegetarian," or "vegan" in any way.

Yet "vegan" was mentioned in 88,300 postings. Greenhouse gases, so named because they contribute to the earth-warming "greenhouse effect," were mentioned in only 83,700 postings, and methane, the most damaging greenhouse gas, emitted mainly by livestock, got just 71,800 mentions.

The "Green Tips for Earth Day" web site, posted by Earth 911 with the support of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, omitted any notice of animal production and meat-eating.

Noting that Earth Day is now more a cultural celebration than a day of awareness-raising and protest, Vermont environmentalist author Bill McKibben and friends organized "Step It Up 2007," a "National Day of Climate Action" held on April 13, a week ahead of Earth Day, to try to increase attention to global warming. More than 1,400 organizations headquartered in all 50 states and many nations abroad took part.

"What do you feel guilty about not doing?" New York magazine writer Tim Murphy asked New York City "Step It Up 2007" coordinator Ben Jervey.

"I don't dry my clothes on hangers instead of using a dryer. Or forgo meat altogether. Studies show that meat consumption is not so energy-efficient," responded Jervey. Jervey, 27, is author of The Big Green Apple, a guide to ecofriendly New York City living.

Apart from Jervey's guilt complex, equating raising animals for slaughter with not hanging up his laundry, "Step It Up 2007" organizers evinced scant awareness of meat-eating as even part of the global warming issue. Meat did not appear to rate so much as a word on the "Step It Up 2007" web site. ANIMAL PEOPLE found traces of only four "Step It Up 2007" events that encouraged meatless eating.

In Britain, the Portsmouth Climate Action Network advertised "a tasty barbecue, with food for all, including vegetarian and vegan." In Saratoga Springs, New York, "Step It Up 2007" coincided with the New York Capital Region Vegetarian Expo.

Friends of Animals, based in Darien, Connecticut, coordinated "Step It Up 2007" rallies in both Norwalk and Westport.

"Activists push diet change to the head of climate change," recounted a Norwalk Hour subhead the following day.

Norwalk Hour staff writer James Walker did not actually mention the contribution of meat-eating to global warming until his eighth of 14 paragraphs, but five of his last seven paragraphs either quoted or paraphrased FoA president Priscilla Feral and the Worldwatch Institute on the role of diet in causing climate change.

Stamford Advocate staff writer Michael Dinan also covered the Norwalk demonstration, but did not mention diet, consistent with the general tendency of U.S. news media to follow mainstream environmentalists in completely overlooking, ignoring, or denying the connection.

U.S. newspaper coverage of global warming has increased by half since 1997, according to a proportionately weighted keyword search by ANIMAL PEOPLE of the archives of 1,428 daily newspapers accessible at www.NewsLibrary.com.

This appears to have raised awareness of the possible results of global warming far more than awareness of any of the causes.

An April 2007 survey conducted jointly by the Washington Post, ABC News, and Stanford University, for instance, found that 84% of Americans recognize that global warming is occurring. More than 70% see it as a major issue.

Asked what to do about it, however, the pollsters found that 62% of respondents believe power plants should be required to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases; 42% favor laws requiring vehicles to be more fuel-efficient; 36% want laws requiring air conditioners, refrigerators, and other appliances to be less polluting; about a third favor higher gasoline taxes; and 20% favor higher taxes on electricity to encourage conservation.

"Most say they would be willing to personally change some things they do in order to mitigate climate change, even if it involves some sacrifice," reported Washington Post staff writers Juliet Eilperin and Jon Cohen. "Nearly three-quarters said they have already made an effort to reduce energy consumption at home; seven in 10 said they already use at least one compact fluorescent light bulb."

But the survey apparently neither asked about meat consumption nor elicited any directly relevant response.

U.S. global warming coverage mentioning cattle rose from 1% of the total in 1997 to 2.6% in 1999--but 1999 was the year with by far the least total global warming coverage. In every other year, just over 1% of the articles mentioning global warming also mentioned cattle.

Global warming coverage mentioning the more general term "livestock" gradually increased from about half of one percent in 1997 to 1% in both 2006 and early 2007.

Global warming coverage mentioning meat rose from 1% in 1997 to 2% in both 2006 and early 2007.

U.N. warning

The paucity of attention from daily newspapers scarcely reflects a lack of scientific evidence. Warned the United Nations Food & Agriculture Organization in a November 2006 report entitled Livestock's Long Shadow--Environmental Issues and Options, "The environmental costs per unit of livestock production must be cut by one half, just to avoid the level of damage worsening."

Elaborated FAO spokesperson Christopher Matthews, "When emissions from land use and land use change are included, the livestock sector accounts for 9% percent of carbon dioxide deriving from human-related activities, and generates 65% of human-related nitrous oxide, which has 296 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide.

"Most of this comes from manure," Matthews emphasized. "Livestock accounts for 37% of all human-induced methane, 23 times as warming as carbon dioxide, which is also largely produced by the digestive system of ruminants, and 64% of ammonia, which contributes significantly to acid rain.

"Livestock now use 30% of the earth's entire land surface," Matthews continued, "mostly permanent pasture, but also including 33% of the global arable land, used to produce feed for livestock. As forests are cleared to create new pastures, [the livestock industry] is a major driver of deforestation, especially in Latin America where, for example, some 70% of former forests in the Amazon have been turned over to grazing."

Only 39 U.S. daily newspapers --just 3%--published anything more than a syndicated summary of the FAO findings.

Most U.S. daily newspapers are, however, heavily dependent upon supermarket advertising, especially the intensely competitive meat ads.

The New York Times, as one of the few dailies that does not even carry supermarket advertising, deliberated over the FAO report for a month before editorializing about it on December 26, 2006.
"When you think about the growth of human population over the last century or so, it is all too easy to imagine it merely as an increase in the number of humans," The New York Times editorialists began. "But as we multiply, so do all things associated with us, including our livestock.

"At present," The New York Times editorialists continued, "there are about 1.5 billion cattle and domestic buffalo, and about 1.7 billion sheep and goats. With pigs and poultry, they form a critical part of our enormous biological footprint upon this planet. Livestock--which consume more food than they yield--also compete directly with humans for water. And the drive to expand grazing land destroys more biologically sensitive terrain, rain forests especially, than anything else. But what is even more striking, and alarming, is that livestock are responsible for about 18% of the global warming effect."

The New York Times summation closely paralleled the statistical summary issued by vegetarian advocate John Robbins 19 years earlier, as part of the promotional kit for Diet For A New America.
"There are no easy trade-offs when it comes to global warming, such as cutting back on cattle to make room for cars," the New York Times noted, but concluded, "As Livestock's Long Shadow makes clear, our health and the health of the planet depend on pushing livestock production in more sustainable directions."

Even before John Robbins published his heads-up, Worldwatch Institute founder Lester Brown had warned in similar terms since the 1970s about the contributions of the meat industry to the production of greenhouse gases. As recently as February 22, 2007, Worldwatch Institute research associate Danielle Nierenberg described the links between raising animals for meat and global warming to the American Academy of Sciences annual conference in San Francisco.

There were plenty of other warnings.

Climate researcher Benoit Leguet, investigating the probable economic consequences of global warming for the French bank Caisse des Depots, told Agence France-Presse in September 2005 that the 20 million cows in France produce 6.5 percent of the nation's greenhouse gas emissions. In total, Leguet determined, French cattle produce 38 million metric tons of greenhouse gases per year, more than three times the volume produced by oil refineries.

Summarized Toby McDonald of the London Times, "There are 1.4 billion cows worldwide, each producing 500 litres of methane a day and accounting for 14% of all emissions of the gas. Carbon dioxide is by far the biggest contributor to climate change, but methane has 23 times the warming potential of carbon dioxide, so reducing its emission is also considered important.

"Cows need to ferment their low-grade food, such as hay and grass, to get any energy from it," McDonald continued, "and the main by-product is methane. Between 9% and 12% of the energy that a cow consumes is converted into methane, depending on diet, barn conditions, and whether the cow is producing milk. In Scotland, where there is a greater concentration of agriculture than in other countries, cows produce 46% of all methane emissions."

This is about 15 times the contribution made by cattle in England, but Scotland has proportionately more cattle and less industrial development.

Biochemist John Wallace of the Rowett Research Institute in Aberdeen, Scotland, told McDonald that altering cows' diets could reduce their methane emissions by as much as 70%, but whether this can be done consistently and in an economically productive manner remains to be established.

Livestock are believed to be responsible for about 12.3% of greenhouse gas emissions from Australian sources, reported Richard Macey of the Sydney Morning Herald in June 2006. Researchers Robert Herd and Andrew Alford of the New South Wales (Australia) Department of Primary Industries told Macey that they believe breeding cattle only from the bulls whose offspring most efficiently convert food into protein could cut cattle methane emissions worldwide by about 3%.

"The leader of the research effort, Roger Hegarty, said it may be possible to develop other methane-efficient animals, including sheep," wrote Macey.

But the sum of the potential gain from selective breeding for methane reduction would be equivalent to the gain from just 3% of the public giving up meat.

Recognizing that livestock were responsible for more than half the New Zealand contribution to greenhouse gas emissions, the New Zealand government in 2003 tried unsuccessfully to tax agricultural methane releases.

The New Zealand Livestock Improvement Corporation is now a member of the Australia-New Zealand Biotechnology Partnership Fund, formed to help produce cattle with more efficient digestive systems.

Using 1938 data

The U.S. lags far behind much of the rest of the world in officially recognizing the greenhouse gas contributions of cattle.

The reasons why include cattle industry lobbying clout, official denial, and use of grossly obsolete data. As of 2005, for example, California air pollution regulations had presumed since 1938 that cows produce an average of just 12.8 pounds of "volatile organic compounds" per year. These are the particulate emissions that contribute to smog, a lower-atmosphere "greenhouse effect," which in 1938 was the only part of the greenhouse emissions issue known to science.

Cattle industry lobbyists argued that the 1938 estimate was about two and a half times too high. Smog researchers, however, believe that since today's cattle are much larger than the cattle of 70 years ago, the typical cow today may emit about 20.6 pounds of "volatile organic compounds" per year--and that's just the relatively solid material, that does not rise to the ozone layer and hover.

The California smog regulations of 1938 were introduced 30 years after Ford Motor Company founder Henry Ford first marketed the Model T, the first mass-produced automobile, and the most popular car in the world for the next 20 years.

The Model T was originally built to run on ethanol, which Ford imagined farmers would produce for themselves, to run cars and his line of Fordson tractors. Very soon, however, Ford realized that farmers preferred feeding corn stalks and other organic material suitable for producing ethanol to cattle and pigs. Distilling fuel with it was economically counter-productive--and was illegal during the Prohibition years, from 1919 to 1932.

Almost a century after Ford gave up on ethanol, the White House under President George W. Bush is still pushing it, as the most officially favored response to global warming, a phenomenon that the Bush administration only formally recognized in 2006.

Summarized Carey Gilliam of Reuters on February 26, 2007, "The Bush administration is proposing $1.6 billion in federal spending to promote ethanol—A shift to fuels such as ethanol can help to slow global warming," in theory, by replacing use of fossil fuels, especially gasoline.

"Traditional ethanol facilities use natural gas or coal to fuel the boilers that create steam and distil ethanol from corn or other plant-based sources," Gilliam continued. "But such operations are vulnerable to volatile natural gas prices, and critics say the pollution associated with coal-fired plants offset the benefits of substituting ethanol for gasoline."

To get around that problem, a company called E3 BioFuels on February 26, 2007 opened the first U.S. facility to produce ethanol from dung. Located near Mead, Nebraska, the E3 BioFuels plant is a combination of factory farm with refinery.

"27,000 cattle stand on slatted floors to deposit an estimated 1.6 million pounds of dung daily into deep pits, which are located adjacent to a new ethanol plant," Gilliam wrote. "The pungent waste is then processed into methane gas, which powers the ethanol plant. Other byproducts of the manure include fertilizer for the surrounding corn fields. Corn is then fed back to the cattle, or distilled into ethanol. The 2,000-acre complex produces about 24 million gallons of ethanol a year."

E3 BioFuels chair Dennis Langley told Gilliam that the $77 million Mead plant "is a prototype for at least 15 similar U.S. projects," including three in Kansas, three in California, two in Nebraska and one in Iowa, each "teamed with feedlots or dairies."

Wrote International Bird Rescue Research Center public affairs director Karen Benzel, who brought E3 BioFuels to the attention of ANIMAL PEOPLE, "This is not how the planet should be saved."

But if history is any indication, it won't be, any more than Earth Day and "Step It Up" events will, if they continue to disregard meat-eating.

Dung-fueled bioreactors built to operate on the scale that Henry Ford envisioned work very well in some places, notably India. In Visakhapatnam, for example, the Visakha SPCA uses the dung from several hundred rescued cattle to supply the electricity that lights the VSPCA complex at night.

Bioreactors, however, produce relatively little energy from a huge volume of waste, and tend to be climate-sensitive.

Before E3 BioFuels, the biggest U.S. effort to produce energy from dung was a methane extraction plant built by the New Charleston Power Company, of Imperial, California. Opened in 1988, the New Charleston plant lost millions of dollars, and instead of becoming a pollution solution, instead became one of the largest pollution point sources in California. Closed in 1994, the plant was still mired in litigation for at least another five years.
--Merritt Clifton