[saagarjha]

> When talking about meat and damage to the environment, the only relevant figures are associated with animal feed (e.g. water consumption per kg of meat).

Cows fart.

[glastra]

It's the burps, actually.

And it's not nearly as dangerous as publicized.

Methane's lifespan in the atmosphere is much, much lower (think two orders of magnitude) than carbon dioxide [0], for example.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_methane

[the8472]

The methane turns into CO2. Which means for the amount of carbon they release it's strictly worse than the same amount of carbon released as CO2.

[glastra]

Yes, you are right. I have conveyed my point only half-way and I apologize.

What I meant is that methane is known to have a bigger heating effect than other greenhouse gases, like x28 that of CO2 if I recall correctly. This is used as part of the anti-ruminant argument, when comparing the effect of methane expelled by animals to the rest of greenhouse gas emissions.

However, if you take into account the reduced lifespan, that 28-time increase is definitely less relevant.

[the8472]

From the WP article you linked:

> Methane in the Earth's atmosphere is a strong greenhouse gas with a global warming potential (GWP) 104 times greater than CO2 in a 20-year time frame; methane is not as persistent a gas as CO2 and tails off to about GWP of 28 for a 100-year time frame

And once you take positive feedbacks into account additional emissions can be problematic even within "short" timeframes.

[glastra]

Absolutely, I never said methane was without effect.

However, its effects on global warming are greatly exaggerated by environmentalists and/or those with vegan ideologies.

In my opinion, focus should definitely not be on meat consumption.

Anyway, as a disclaimer, I follow a carnivore diet consisting of only animal products. You can expect me to be heavily biased.