{"id":1342,"date":"2009-10-22T11:42:14","date_gmt":"2009-10-22T15:42:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.energyrefuge.com\/blog\/?p=1342"},"modified":"2017-09-05T17:53:16","modified_gmt":"2017-09-05T21:53:16","slug":"livestock-accounts-for-51-of-greenhouse-gas-emissions-says-new-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.energyrefuge.com\/blog\/livestock-accounts-for-51-of-greenhouse-gas-emissions-says-new-report\/","title":{"rendered":"Livestock accounts for 51% of greenhouse gas emissions, says new report"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Worldwatch
Worldwatch Magazine<\/figcaption><\/figure>In 2006 a report compiled by the UN\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Food and Agriculture arm found that livestock\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s greenhouse emissions accounts for 18% of the total, while the global transportation network, a much more targeted culprit, accounts for a lot less at 13%. The report is called Livestock\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Long Shadow and it has been widely quoted ever since by environmentalists and vegetarians as strong evidence that a plant-based diet is kinder to the planet (not to mention the animals, of course).
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Now evidence has emerged that the figure was \u00e2\u20ac\u0153grossly underestimated\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and a new report by the Worldwatch Institute has remade the calculations. The report, called Livestock and Climate Change<\/em>, concludes that livestock\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s contribution to greenhouse emissions actually accounts for 51% of the total. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s nearly three times the previously estimated figure.
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\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Recent analysis by Robert Goodland and Jeff Anhang finds that livestock and their byproducts actually account for at least 32.6 billion tons of carbon dioxide per year, or 51 percent of annual worldwide GHG emissions\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, the organization says on its website.<\/p>\n

The report can be downloaded for free here<\/a>. Treehugger has published a breakdown<\/a> of the factors that explain why livestock is such a major polluter. The popular green blog concludes: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The overall message can really be boiled down to this: One of the cheapest and most effective ways of mitigating climate change is eating far less meat and dairy or (better yet) eating none and adopting a full vegetarian or vegan diet. It’s going to take a cultural shift to do this, to be sure, but the effect is huge.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d
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\"Reblog<\/a>