Human food from animals might represent a stronger lever for climate-change mitigation than was indicated by a study reported here last week.
That study, by Chatham House of London, cited an estimate that 14.5% of the world's total greenhouse gas emissions come from livestock and supporting activities. It argued that keeping globally averaged temperature within official targets required attention not only to energy use but also to eating habits.
Last week's point here was the political hopelessness of coercing people to moderate consumption both of affordable energy and of meat and dairy products.
As knowledgeable readers pointed out, even higher estimates exist for emissions related to production, processing, and transportation of the animal protein people consume.
A 2009 article in World Watch, by the late Robert Goodland of the World Bank and Jeff Anhang of International Finance Corp., assessed the share of greenhouse gas emissions caused by humans worldwide and attributable to livestock products at 51% or more.
The article critiqued a 2006 study by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization asserting a much lower number (see www.chompingclimatechange.org). It offered new data to account for what the authors argue are uncounted and misallocated emissions related to livestock products.
"If this argument is right," the article suggested, "it implies that replacing livestock products with better alternatives would be the best strategy for reversing climate change."
Two political constituencies might cringe at this: farmers pasturing livestock and lovers of meat and milk.
For the latter group comes work by a new industry developing protein-rich food not derived from animals. Microsoft magnate Bill Gates, who invests in some of them, claims not to be able to taste the difference between meat from livestock and the other kind.
And for farmers: good news! The nonmeat protein comes from plants, which someone has to grow.
The Goodland-Anhang view has its detractors, of course. But it raises the tantalizing prospect of energy politics driven by something other than unquestioning, myopic damnation of fossil energy.
