Climate Change, Methane and Your Food Choices
by Erik Adams

On his recent visit, David Suzuki quite rightly described methane as being 22 times more potent a greenhouse gas than CO2.

Many environmentalists and Greenhouse lobbyists overlook the important role that non-CO2 Greenhouse gases are playing in influencing climate change.

A recent study undertaken by Dr. James Hansen, director of NASA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies has shown that the reduction of non-CO2 gases may be far more important than we realise. Dr Hansen, a veteran supporter of action against global warming, often cited by Al Gore and called “a grandfather of the global warming theory”, has concluded from his research that CO2 emissions are NOT the main cause of atmospheric warming.
Many other greenhouse gases trap heat far more powerfully than CO2, some of them tens of thousands of times more powerfully.
Of these non-CO2 gases, methane is by far the most important being responsible for almost as much global warming as all the other non-CO2 gases combined.

While atmospheric concentrations of CO2 have risen by about 31% since pre-industrial times, methane concentrations have more than doubled. Whereas human sources of CO2 amount to just 3% of natural emissions, human sources of methane produce one and a half times as much as all natural sources.
Dr. Hansen estimates that methane emissions are causing nearly half of the planet’s human-induced warming and warns that methane reduction must be a priority of any climate change reduction strategy.

Methane is produced by a number of sources, including coal mining and landfills—but the number one source worldwide is animal agriculture. Animal agriculture produces more than 100 million tons of methane a year and this source is on the rise: global meat consumption has increased fivefold in the past fifty years, and shows little sign of abating. About 85% of this methane is produced in the digestive processes of livestock, and while a single cow releases a relatively small amount of methane, the collective effect on the environment of the hundreds of millions of livestock animals worldwide is enormous. An additional 15% of animal agricultural methane emissions are released from the massive “lagoons” used to store untreated farm animal waste, and already a target of environmentalists’ for their role as the number one source of water pollution in the U.S.

Consider then that the food choices we make everyday may have more impact on climate change than our energy choices. If one is serious about global warming a lessening of our meat consumption and a move towards a vegetarian/vegan diet is essential and could achieve a reduction in global warming much more rapidly than waiting for the government and energy industry to get serious about renewable energy sources . In addition, it is already well known that the production of a meat-centered diet consumes 3 times more fossil fuels than a meat-free one, far more water, and is responsible for most land clearing. Not only that, a vegetarian diet reduces your chances of being obese and of developing cancer or heart disease - all epidemics of our society.