In my Introduction to Environmental Studies program, at the Evergreen State College, we do weekly seminar readings where we discuss a book related to that week's theme. A couple of weeks ago our book to read was Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming by Paul Hawken. It sounds like an ambitious title, because it is. The nice thing about Drawdown was that it didn't have a whole lot of fluff. It just had straight facts and very short chapters, for example, in the first part of the book, the Energy section, it had through 18 chapters on types of renewable energy and how much carbon emissions they can save. While I loved the section on energy, what shocked me was that "what we eat turns out to be the number one cause of global warming."(Paul Hawken)
Our food system is elaborate and complex. On the individual level people can buy locally, try to buy in small portions, and what isn't eaten, fed to other animals or composted. Although not every state/country has trucks come to collect compost (I'm looking at you, Arizona), and not everyone is involved in the social norm of trying to reduce food waste, we can't blame the individual for food being the #1 cause of global warming. We have to change the food system.
Reducing your meat intake or becoming vegetarian can be a great way to reduce your carbon footprint. But the carbon cost of veggies can add up. "Fossil fuels power tractors, fishing vessels, transport, processing, chemicals, packaging materials, refrigeration, supermarkets, and kitchens. Chemical fertilizers atomize into the air, forming the powerful greenhouse gas nitrous oxide."(Paul Hawken)
The solutions are numerous! Drawdown suggests farmland restoration, reduced food waste in processing ("Yet a third of the food raised or prepared does not make it from farm or factory to fork"), clean cookstoves ("The cooking fuels used by 40 percent of humanity are wood, charcoal, animal dung, crop residues, and coal. As these solids burn, often inside homes or in areas with limited ventilation, they release plumes of smoke and soot liable for 4.3 million premature deaths each year."), improved rice cultivation, silvopasture, and many more.
If reducing greenhouse gases and food waste are important to you, you have tons of ways to make a difference! You can change you or your family's food habits, or join/make an organization to facilitate big social changes!
Blog post by: Robin Chapman
Bibliography:
Hawken, Paul. Drawdown: the Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming. Penguin Books, 2018.
Comments