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Big meat’s big PR investments are blocking climate action (www.energymonitor.ai)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Even everyone skipping one meat meal a week would have a huge impact. But really what I was getting at was that no matter what shenanigans the meat industry is pulling, they can’t force anyone to eat meat. The headline/angle of the story was a bit much. A lot of it reminds me of the oil industry — as alternatives become more and more attractive, people will naturally graduate towards whatever is cheaper and tastier.

I’ve also read they are experimenting with changing livestock diets to cut down on methane emissions. Which is good, but I’d also like to see more legislation to treat the animals humanely. Too much corporate farming these days is cruel.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Yes and part of what they are spending lots of money doing is trying to convince people not to make any changes to their consumption

For the feed additives bit, it's more greenwashing than it is an actual method to reduce emissions. Meat production levels and in turn consumption levels really are going to have to change

What’s more, feeding cattle algae is really only practical where it’s least needed: on feedlots. This is where most cattle are crowded in the final months of their 1.5- to 2-year lives to rapidly put on weight before slaughter. There, algae feed additives can be churned into the cows’ grain and soy feed. But on feedlots, cattle already belch less methane—only 11 percent of their lifetime output

[...]

Unfortunately, adding the algae to diets on the pasture, where it’s most needed, isn’t a feasible option either. Out on grazing lands, it’s difficult to get cows to eat additives because they don’t like the taste of red algae unless it’s diluted into feed. And even if we did find ways to sneak algae in somehow, there’s a good chance their gut microbes would adapt and adjust, bringing their belches’ methane right back to high levels.

[...]

All told, if we accept the most promising claims of the algae boosters, we’re talking about an 80 percent reduction of methane among only 11 percent of all burps—roughly an 8.8 percent reduction total

https://www.wired.com/story/carbon-neutral-cows-algae/

More broadly

Plant-based foods have a significantly smaller footprint on the environment than animal-based foods. Even the least sustainable vegetables and cereals cause less environmental harm than the lowest impact meat and dairy products [9].

https://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/14/8/1614/htm