Forty miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border in Southern California’s Imperial Valley, the Brandt Company cattle ranch is the largest single point source of methane emissions in the state, releasing more of that greenhouse gas than any oil or gas well, refinery or landfill. The 643-acre feedlot is home to 139,000 beef cattle, according to […]
Power tools are not the main source of emissions for raising cattle. Methane emissions happen in ruminents from digestion. Grazing-only production actually has overall higher methane emissions due to longer growing times and lower slaughter weight. Further, it does not scale well in the slightest. For instance, the US would need a 4x reduction in beef consumption using 100% of available land (if you want to avoid high deforestation pressure, you would need even more reduction)
We model a nationwide transition [in the US] from grain- to grass-finishing systems using demographics of present-day beef cattle. In order to produce the same quantity of beef as the present-day system, we find that a nationwide shift to exclusively grass-fed beef would require increasing the national cattle herd from 77 to 100 million cattle, an increase of 30%. We also find that the current pastureland grass resource can support only 27% of the current beef supply (27 million cattle), an amount 30% smaller than prior estimates
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If beef consumption is not reduced and is instead satisfied by greater imports of grass-fed beef, a switch to purely grass-fed systems would likely result in higher environmental costs, including higher overall
methane emissions. Thus, only reductions in beef consumption can guarantee reductions in the environmental impact of US food systems.
If I source my beef or lamb from low-impact producers, could they have a lower footprint than plant-based alternatives?
The evidence suggests, no: plant-based foods emit fewer greenhouse gases than meat and dairy, regardless of how they are produced.
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Plant-based protein sources – tofu, beans, peas and nuts – have the lowest carbon footprint. This is certainly true when you compare average emissions. But it’s still true when you compare the extremes: there’s not much overlap in emissions between the worst producers of plant proteins, and the best producers of meat and dairy.
Power tools are not the main source of emissions for raising cattle. Methane emissions happen in ruminents from digestion. Grazing-only production actually has overall higher methane emissions due to longer growing times and lower slaughter weight. Further, it does not scale well in the slightest. For instance, the US would need a 4x reduction in beef consumption using 100% of available land (if you want to avoid high deforestation pressure, you would need even more reduction)
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aad401
More broadly
https://ourworldindata.org/less-meat-or-sustainable-meat
citation needed
I gave one in my comment? There’s a quote with a source there
not for that claim