Frog Blog

Shopping and Consumer Choices

The Frog will explore The Climate Action Handbook: A Visual Guide to 100 Climate Solutions by Heidi Roop in the first 100 days of 2024

In 2015, a climate scientist was presenting a data driven talk at my company on how global warming was impacting the weather in the upper Midwest. The talk title “Climate Change in Our Own Backyard” presented an analysis of the data gathered by the vast network of weather stations in the stated and predicted the future based on facts: summers will be warmer and wetter, there will be more weather patterns with damaging heavy rains, and winters will be warmer. All these predictions have come to pass.

At the end of the session, there were questions. The presentation is open to all, and are not meant to be controversial. They can be so, it seems. For instance, in 2006 at a similar talk, someone stood up and asked whether the climate change data could be explained by something something contrails something. The speaker was gracious and answered politely that the data did not fit that hypothesis.

And so it was for the 2015 session. One of my enlightened colleagues at a supposedly science inspired manufacturing company stood up and asked the following: “would not climate change be solved if we eliminated half of the world’s population?”. The speaker, once again gracious, assured the person that less drastic solutions were possible to allow for population growth and reduced the effects of damaging climate change.

Call it the Thanos Decision – to snap your fingers, wipe out half the life in the Universe to bring balance and prevent overpopulation and depletion of resources. Search it, especially the debates of the amateur philosophers on Reddit or Quora. The ethical answer to whether his approach had merit is murky and the debate usually ends up somewhere around “maybe, but c’mon dude, really?”.

But research shows that the greatest action you can take to reduce emissions is to have one fewer child. In the study, the climate impact was arrived with an approach described by the authors where “half of a child’s emissions are assigned to each parent, as well as one quarter of that child’s offspring (the grandchildren) and so forth. This is consistent with our use of research employing the fullest possible life cycle approach in order to capture the magnitude of emissions decisions”.

The paper was more about the fact that governments and educational institution tended to play down the one-fewer child action in recommendations, opting for the more politically correct but way less effective actions of upgrading light bulbs and recycling. Classic greenwashing, in other words.

The decision to have a child is personal and complex, and impossible to quantify for any given person. True, one can perform a techno-economic analysis and decide that families that have one fewer child (or no children) in a wealthy country with high emissions per capita would have an impact on climate change. But the subject is nuanced and beyond the scope of this section.

If you are raising a family and are expecting a child, you will be, if you allow it, subjected to societal pressure and social media influence on just about every aspect of raising a child. One of the greatest controversies is the “Grand Disposable vs Cloth Diaper Debate” (which is actually not a thing and I only capitalized it for effect). What to put on your baby’s butt as a containment solution should be a decision based on your own values and family experience, and maybe informed, but not necessarily driven by data related to climate change.

So here it is. In the US, 95% of babies wear disposable diapers, and the discarded diapers end up as “about 7 percent of nondurable household waste in landfills each year”. This is obviously a municipal waste issue, and cloth diapers definitely have less of an impact on landfills.

But the climate impact of both disposable and cloth diapers is about balanced. When you do the life-cycle analysis of disposable diapers you find that their carbon footprint results in emissions equivalent to burning 62 gallons of gasoline in the average lifetime of their use (roughly 2.5 years). This is roughly consistent with the carbon footprint associated cloth diapers including the production process and the energy and water consumed in laundering during the same time period.

So when are anticipating the arrival of your child, make a good choice for your lifestyle and and if you choose to use disposable diapers, do the best you can to choose companies that fit your values. In our case, we were in a position to use cloth diapers for our first child, and it was not that much of a burden for new parents in graduate school. However, the complexity of our life with two children dictated the use of disposable diapers for the second, which was not all that much “easier” than the use of cloth diapers, but was compatible with our lifestyle at the time.

For parents, the diaper years are soon behind us, and the children continue to grow and hopefully thrive. Thus the most important action you can take and perhaps the biggest impact you can make is to raise your children with full awareness of the challenges they will face in a changing climate, and work to equip them with the knowledge and skills to take action when they are ready to be the climate leaders.

Next Up: Climate Action in 2024 – Day 43: Ditch the Bottled Water

#rescuethatfrog
Email: rescuethatfrog@gmail.com

Shopping and Consumer Choices

The Frog will explore The Climate Action Handbook: A Visual Guide to 100 Climate Solutions by Heidi Roop in the first 100 days of 2024

Take a moment and reflect on what you are wearing and what’s in your closet, in light of your understanding of the impact of supply chains on climate change. For your average pair of jeans, a cotton crop is grown and harvested, water, energy, and chemicals are used to manufacture the fabric, and they are transported to the store or online retailer where you buy them.

The emissions aside, the waste from the fashion industry is estimated to be over 92 million pounds per year. It is not just that we are clothing ourselves to fit our lifestyles and occupations, but rather it is the widescale practice of “fast fashion” that is driving the waste and climate impact. In an unsustainable practice “73 percent of discarded textile materials end up buried or burned” with only 1 percent being recycled into new clothing.

And the trend is to more waste as over the last 15 years we have seen a 36 percent decrease in the number of times the average garment is worn. Shoes are the same, with the US leading the world in the consumption of shoes at 7 shoes per capita compared to 2.9 shoes per capita globally which translates to 94 kg of CO2e emissions per capita with production and transportation the key contributors to emissions.

“The apparel and footwear industry account for 6 to 10 percent of global greenhouse emissions”

Heidi Roop

You can search “sustainable clothing brands” and the claims are obscure and despite the prevalent use of green labels (and greenwashing) it is possible that there may not be a supply-side solution to this issue. Clothing rentals or short-term recycling services may not be a climate-friendly approach either.

Heidi recommends “embracing the first two Rs in ‘reduce, reuse, recycle'”. We can sort our closets and dressers into the quality, long-lasting clothing and the “fast fashion”. The actions you can take can start today and be an evolution as you buy fewer clothes, wear what you have longer and find ways to pass along the ones that don’t work for you.

When I went to create a new wardrobe for a new position several years ago, I was guided at a local store to choose two jackets, two shirts, and two pairs of pants that could be mixed and matched in any combination. They were expensive, but quality clothing like this will last a long time and be versatile for any work situation. You combine that with some simple skills like repairing a torn seam, and you can look good for years!

Next Up: Climate Action in 2024 – Day 42: Weigh Your Diaper Options

#rescuethatfrog
Email: rescuethatfrog@gmail.com

Shopping and Consumer Choices

The Frog will explore The Climate Action Handbook: A Visual Guide to 100 Climate Solutions by Heidi Roop in the first 100 days of 2024

We have all grown up with a linear economy. The manufacturing and consumption premise of the US since World War II is predicated on taking raw materials from the earth, using energy to fashion some product, selling that product to a consumer, who uses it for its useful life, and then discards it. This was the deliberate choice of a burgeoning economy, which was different prior to the war and through the Great Depression when “reduce, reuse, recycle” was the paradigm

It needs to be so again. The energy and waste cost of a linear economy is by its very definition unsustainable given the finite resources on the planet. Also given that we are burning fossil fuel the drive the manufacturing engine for a linear economy and that is a significant source of the greenhouse gas pollution in our atmosphere.

So to continue to exist on this planet we must rapidly evolve to a circular economy where not only the materials that make up our products are kept in circulation, but the energy to drive the manufacturing is as close to net zero as possible. Clearly this is complex and will require a major overhaul almost all aspects of our current economy.

For a full exploration of the circular economy, I encourage you to look to the Circular Economy Program at the National Institute of Science and Technology (NIST). I have had the privilege of interacting with Dr. Kate Beers, the Director of the program. The NIST team is leading the approach to a transition away from how we currently product products to one where the “atoms and molecules that make up those products repeatedly cycle within the economy and retain their value”.

So we exist in a largely linear “throwaway” economy. Enough techno-economic analyses have been done to highlight the benefits in addressing climate change of alternative approaches, including:

• Direct reuse of products – 100% reduction in GHG emissions
• Repair – 93-99% reduction in GHG emissions
• Refurbishment – 80-99% reduction in GHG emissions
• Remanufacturing – 79-99% reduction in GHG emissions

These actions are personal and effective. By working to reduce our overall consumption and seeking to use refurbished and remanufactured goods, we can have a significant impact on our individual emissions and model behavior for our friends, family, and community. Already there are sharing communities sustained by social media. For instance we have a local group that models the Buy Nothing Project where everything is shared freely in the community. No strings. Free.

This action is perfectly aligned to taking direct action within your local community. Little Free Libraries. Tool exchanges. Your local recycling center likely retains useful items for you to pick up and reuse. Not only does this bring a community closer together with a shared vision, it makes good solid economic sense!

“Sharing is caring.. for your community and the climate!”

Heidi Rop

Next Up: Climate Action in 2024 – Day 41: Turn Away From Fast Fashion

Howard Creel

#rescuethatfrog
Email: rescuethatfrog@gmail.com

Food and Farming

The Frog will explore The Climate Action Handbook: A Visual Guide to 100 Climate Solutions by Heidi Roop in the first 100 days of 2024

This is just a typical week in the US. There was a failed impeachment vote. Joe Biden apparently mishandled classified documents. Tucker Carlson released an interview with Vladimir Putin. The ocean temperature hit an all-time high.

Last summer the ocean off the coast of Florida was close to that of your typical hot tub – the 93-96°F (34-36°C) ocean temperature was described as “downright shocking“. The effects of warming oceans are devastating including coral bleaching, sea level rise, increased hurricane intensity, disrupted weather patterns, and the wholesale death of marine life. The oceans on the Earth are a tremendous heat sink – over 90% of the excess heat created by humans through burning fossil fuels has been absorbed by seawater.

In a challenge to the world’s food supplies, global fish and shellfish stocks are susceptible to rising temperatures. Cold water fish like cod and salmon are particularly vulnerable in warmer water. Fish have to work harder and need more food to sustain themselves. Spawning patterns are disrupted. On the other hand, embodying the essence of change, some may benefit: for instance, species like lobsters. squid, and black see bass are turning up for the first time in the cooler seabeds off the coast of Canada.

Commercial fishing itself creates a staggering 179 million metric tons of CO2e per year; this represents “3.5 pounds of carbon emissions for each 2.2 pounds of fish caught”. You can normalize the nutritional value of different fish stocks by the emissions required to produce them as food products: sardines, anchovies, and shellfish having the lowest impact relative to others like lobsters and crabs. Wild-caught fish have a lower climate and environmental impact compared to farmed fish, however farmed fish tend to have less waste associated with their processing and transportation.

It is time to take action, but given that even with urgent action the oceans will continue to warm and will stay warm for centuries, what direct action can be taken on behalf of marine wildlife is unclear. Sourcing locally is always a good start. Living in Minnesota, if it is not walleye (or other freshwater fish), it is likely that the seafood in the grocery has been on a truck or a plane on its way to your table!

Seafood Watch, hosted by the Monterey Bay Aquarium provides a Seafood Guide for consumers to find “more in-depth information about how and where to find sustainable sources of some of the most popular seafood items served in the US” in addition to valuable insight and background information for your use in making responsible seafood choices.

Next Up: Climate Action in 2024 – Day 40: Reduce Consumption Through Community Sharing

Howard Creel

#rescuethatfrog
Email: rescuethatfrog@gmail.com

Food and Farming

The Frog will explore The Climate Action Handbook: A Visual Guide to 100 Climate Solutions by Heidi Roop in the first 100 days of 2024

I enjoy and appreciate coffee. I like the flavor of black coffee, and when I drink a good cup of coffee, it makes me happy. I have met people who obsess over methods to produce the elusive perfect cup of coffee, but I choose to not put that much effort into it. When presented with a well-made cup of coffee, I just make sure I take a moment to enjoy it when I drink it and reflect on how I content I am in that moment.

For those local to St. Paul, check out Claddagh Coffee Café. Yum.

Of the big nationwide coffee brands, we tend to favor Caribou Coffee as it is homegrown Minnesotan. At home we brew their Mahogany Blend, a dark roasted coffee describe this way: “clean, dry vanilla flavors and raw sugar give this dark roast blend a robust flavor profile, while heady aromatic woods and leather add a rugged, complex edge”. Sublime.

In their advertising, Caribou sells that they source 100 percent of their coffee from Rainforest Alliance Certified® farms, which helps to support conservation, biodiversity, and improved communities for the farmers that supply their coffee. Not only supporting farmers and farmworkers they are building an important alliance of “forest communities, companies, governments, civil society partners, and millions of individuals are committed to creating a world where people and nature thrive together”.  It should be noted that they also have adopted a frog as their emblem!

The challenge for a changing climate is that the coffee industry has matured utilizing only two varieties of coffee: coffea arabica, or simply Arabica and coffea canephora, also known as Robusta. Arabica is generally preferred by the larger coffee chains and Robusta is considered cheaper, more bitter and lower quality.

Climate change is impacting the growing conditions of coffee as it is all other agricultural products. True to the name, Robusta tends to be hardier and able to tolerate higher temperatures. A future where Arabica dies out and we are forced to only consume Robusta will likely diminish the industry. And maybe that’s OK. However, it is a large industry and in response to on-going climate change, industry groups are forming that are promoting the discovery and development of climate-resistant varieties.

For the coffee industry, the connection between the land use policies of Brazil, the largest producer (and other producing countries) and the US, the largest consumer is critically important. In the US, our consumer choices are sometimes frivolous and driven by the latest marketing campaign and always by desire for convenience. Combined with a commitment to action and a bit of research, and perhaps thoughtful investment and advocacy, our daily choices on how we spend our money for coffee may determine the future of the industry as the climate changes.

There are many choices, and you should cherish any brand or company that commits to sustainable production and supply. One of our favorites is Dunn Brothers Coffee, where you can see the roasting process in the store and purchase beans that were roasted that day. In addition, Dunn Brothers, among others, have partnered with World Coffee Research which is actively leading and sponsoring research to “secure a diverse and sustainable quality coffee today and for generations to come”.

And minimize the use of disposable cups and plastic pods as you enjoy your drink.

If coffee is important to you, investing in these types of ethical advocacy groups will help ensure not only that you can continue to enjoy that tasty cup and but that there will be an equitable business for the whole value chain, farmers to roasters, and that the industry is developed to be sustainable and climate-smart*.

*David Reay‘s 2019 book Climate-Smart Food, which can be downloaded for free. Climate-smart food is described and detailed “whereby climate resilience and productivity are increased while greenhouse gas emissions are simultaneously reduced”. Chapter 8 is on coffee.

Next Up: Climate Action in 2024 – Day 39: Support Local, Sustainable Fisheries

Howard Creel

#rescuethatfrog
Email: rescuethatfrog@gmail.com

Food and Farming

The Frog will explore The Climate Action Handbook: A Visual Guide to 100 Climate Solutions by Heidi Roop in the first 100 days of 2024

Climate change. Habitat change. Growing seasons and agricultural practices change. We are seeing a shift in growing regions already as pests, disease, extreme heat, sea level rise, wildfires and other stresses change the way we grow everything.

Imagine owning and operating one of the oldest wineries in the world. Or imagine you are just starting in the business and the financial health of your family depends on the steady growth of your product sales and brand. You have a hot dry season that stresses your vines and reduces your yields. An atmospheric river inundates your land and causes landslides. Your entire vineyard is destroyed in a wildfire.

Extreme heat is likely to reduce the area that premium grapes can be grown by half. The worst case scenarios for climate change may result in more than 70% of suitable areas for wine production. At a bare minimum, the taste and variety of these wine, distilled spirits, and brewed beverages are likely to profoundly change.

Heidi lists some of the inevitable challenges that we are likely to face in the production of these products as the climate changes:

• Grown at higher elevation
• Grown increasingly farther from the equator
• Wildfires
• Declining yields and quality
• Shifting growing regions
• Ealier harvests
• Groundwater salinization
• Smoke
• Quicker ripening
• Fungi and mildew
• 50% reduction in premium grape-growing areas
• Negative impacts on outdoor workforce
• Soil erosion
• Extreme heat
• Pests
• Rising sea levels and flooding
• Soil desertification
• Early buds succumbing to frost
• Excessive rain

Better World Shopper is a public resource that makes social and environmental data available to consumers to “ranks every product on the shelf from A to F so you can quickly tell the ‘good guys’ from the ‘bad guys’ — turning your grocery list into a powerful tool to change the world”. Organizations like this are dedicated to helping you choose those companies that understand and are doing what they can do address the impending calamity.

They highlight companies like New Belgium Brewing, which claims to be a “human-powered brewery” with four guiding principles: “do right by people”, “make world-class beer for everyone”, “inspire social and environmental change”, and have a hell of a lot of fun”. New Belgium is a B Corp Certification given to companies that “meet high standards of social and environmental performance, accountability, and transparency”.

Choose Fat Tire Beer as it is the first certified carbon neutral beer and the company encourages you to drink sustainably. You can also find over two hundred brewers that have signed the Brewers Climate Declaration and you can find associations of wine producers like the International Wineries for Climate Action that are “taking a science-based approach to reducing carbon emissions across the wine industry”.

As always, be thoughtful, research your choices and choose according to your values. And cheers!

Next Up: Climate Action in 2024 – Day 38: Get to Know Your Favorite Coffee

Howard Creel

#rescuethatfrog
Email: rescuethatfrog@gmail.com

Food and Farming

The Frog will explore The Climate Action Handbook: A Visual Guide to 100 Climate Solutions by Heidi Roop in the first 100 days of 2024

Chocolate passions confront climate change. Here we go. I enjoy dark, rich chocolate. This one is hitting a bit close to home.

Heidi describes cacao trees as Goldilocks – “a bit fussy about their climate setting”. Production farming requires a consistent set of environmental conditions that are mostly found about 1300 miles on either side of the equator. Most of our chocolate comes from farms in West Africa (Cote d’Ivoire and Ghana), Indonesia, South America, India, and Hawaii.

According to advocates for sustainable cocoa production “cocoa farmers are already seeing the impacts of climate change and if we don’t take action, current cocoa-producing regions may no longer be suitable for cocoa production in the next 30 years”. They cite deforestation and climate change as a main driver for changes in the industry. Cacao trees are increasingly stressed, especially by drier conditions that lower yields. It is likely that continuing production will required converting land that is, for example, at a higher altitude with similar humidity, temperature, and rainfall.

The focus for advocacy groups is on educating farmers to utilize modern techniques and data driven decision making, researching conservation methods, and developing new climate tolerant cacao varieties, for instance leveraging wild cacao varieties that may be more drought tolerant.

NOAA has an informative site that lays out the challenges and opportunities for the industry to evolve in the face of a changing climate. They lead with an apt quote that highlights the challenges of addressing the consumer’s passion for good chocolate:

“Carob is a brown powder made from the pulverized fruit of a Mediterranean evergreen. Some consider carob an adequate substitute for chocolate…because it can, when combined with vegetable fat and sugar, be made to approximate the color and consistency of chocolate. Of course, the same arguments can as persuasively be made in favor of dirt.” Sandra Boynton in CHOCOLATE: The Consuming Passion.

You can take action now through your choice of chocolate brands, shopping and consuming wisely, and reducing waste (picture the candy collected then thrown out at Halloween). Our local grocery store is highlighting sustainable brands, some of which are on the list from LeafScore with Beyond Good standing out.

For your research you can start with Mighty Earth that tracks the cocoa industry and publishes their Chocolate Egg Scorecard for the sustainability performance of chocolate companies. Popular “Big Chocolate” companies like Nestlé, Hershey’s, and Mars were awarded a yellow chocolate bunny because they are “starting to implement good policies”. [They really don’t like Storck (manufacturer of Werther’s, Toffifay, Merci), awarding them a Rotten Egg two years in a row].

David Reay explores more climate aspects of our food in his 2019 book Climate-Smart Food, which can be downloaded for free. Climate-smart food is described and detailed “whereby climate resilience and productivity are increased while greenhouse gas emissions are simultaneously reduced”. Chapter 6 is on chocolate.

Next Up: Climate Action in 2024 – Day 37: Imbibe With Climate in Mind

Howard Creel

#rescuethatfrog
Email: rescuethatfrog@gmail.com

Food and Farming

The Frog will explore The Climate Action Handbook: A Visual Guide to 100 Climate Solutions by Heidi Roop in the first 100 days of 2024

There are a number of good reasons to support local farming and food sources, not the least is a moral or ethical drive to support one’s local community. From a climate standpoint, it is not necessarily true that sourcing your food locally will have an impact. It seems likely that if your food comes to you on a truck it will have a significant amount of associated emissions. However, Heidi cites studies that suggest that transportation is responsible for less than 15% of the emissions from the production of food.

A 2013 life cycle analysis of processed tomatoes in Michigan demonstrated the rough equivalence of energy use and emissions products from California compared to similar products sourced locally. The California products were shipped by rail: shipping by truck resulted in a fourfold energy increase for the imported goods and made the local products the climate choice.

“Food systems can never be reduced to a simple binary of local is better and conventional is worse or its inverse… because of the complexities of the production and distribution systems and their relationship to [greenhouse gas] emissions”

Christensen et al, 2017

Everything matters including agricultural practices, land use, energy for processing, and transportation. Widespread pesticide and fertilizer use, habitat loss, run-off, water resources and emissions have to be figured into a complex life cycle calculation. That said, if you go to your grocery store and pick up a can of tomato paste, it is likely you will not be able tell if it came to you by rail or by truck. I doubt your grocer will know.

Your action will follow your inclinations. For our family, we enjoy making the rounds of local farmer’s markets and sourcing the fresh produce from there. We choose to (and have the means to) choose locally sourced products as often as we can, but admit it is more about supporting our region (keeping the money here) than a concern for the relative climate impact: this is logical and consistent with our values.

I think we should all know much more about how our food reaches us than we typically do now. Exploring your local producers starts with deciding to be thoughtful about your choices and building awareness of your options. More frequent and routine visits to the farmer’s markets. Impulse buys from the roadside stand your pass on the way home from work. Checking out food co-ops.

And as always, eat healthy and in moderation. Cheers!

Next Up: Climate Action in 2024 – Day 36: Enjoy Your Chocolate Responsibly

Howard Creel

#rescuethatfrog
Email: rescuethatfrog@gmail.com

Food and Farming

The Frog will explore The Climate Action Handbook: A Visual Guide to 100 Climate Solutions by Heidi Roop in the first 100 days of 2024

If you ever are concerned about “milk” semantics, use the chemist’s definition: an emulsion of fat globules in an aqueous media (as opposed to the FDA’s: “Milk is the lacteal secretion, practically free from colostrum, obtained by the complete milking of one or more healthy cow”).

At any rate, if you like aqueous fat emulsions to drink or make your coffee lighter, and are concerned about the environment, you have a number of nondairy alternatives to sort through. Cow’s milk is higher in protein than plant derived milks and naturally contains calcium and iodine (which may or may not be added to the alternatives). It pays to read the label if you require these supplements.

Given the environmental and climate toll of dairy, making a switch to any of the alternatives is an important action. Comparing across the plant-based alternatives, with all things being equal, oat milk likely has the lowest environment impact. Oat crops requires less water and fertilizer than almonds and in some countries soy production is preceded by devastating deforestation. It is often listed as the preferred alternative.

The them of these actions is that our food choices can have a big impact on mitigating climate change, as “globally, our food supply chain accounts for 26 percent of human-cause greenhouse gas emissions”.

Most importantly, that data clearly shows that our cherished, long-established industries, like beef and dairy, will have to be drastically curtailed to meet even the most hopeful goals for addressing climate change. You can move that process along through the actions you take at the grocery store, where you deliberately choose producers and brands that align with your values, minimize packaging, and build a lifestyle that minimizes food waste. And as always, research to become knowledgeable, become comfortable in your messaging, help educate your legislators, and make your voice heard in your community and online.

And learn to drink your coffee black, (as Denis Leary called it “coffee flavored coffee“) or, if you have to add what I refer to as “heinous creamer”, reach for the oat milk.

Next Up: Climate Action in 2024 – Day 35: Look Into Eating Locally

Howard Creel

#rescuethatfrog
Email: rescuethatfrog@gmail.com

Food and Farming

The Frog will explore The Climate Action Handbook: A Visual Guide to 100 Climate Solutions by Heidi Roop in the first 100 days of 2024

We are not much of a hamburger family in general, but we all agree Impossible™ plant based burgers off the grill are quite tasty. Impossible claims that they “make delicious meat products, from plants, so you can eat what you love, and save the planet that you love. Small actions lead to big change”. Plant-based meat alternatives are growing in popularity, and their impact is starting to be felt in restaurants and grocery stores.

There is also significant investment in developing economical approaches to cultivated (or cultured) meat alternatives. In this form of “cellular agriculture” appropriate animal cells are cultured and grown into meat products in a laboratory or factory. Knowing the major impact that raising cattle for beef production has on driving climate change (Action 28), on the surface it may appear that producing cultivated meat in a seemingly less resource intensive, controlled process should have some advantages in climate mitigation.

Will switching to plant-based or cultivated meats have a positive impact? It turns out that it is, as are all things climate, complicated, and so it depends. Both plant-based and cultivated meats have a lower carbon footprint than beef, so a switch is a positive action. But if you mostly eat meat in the form of poultry, that has a lower carbon footprint that the alternatives, according to the Breakthrough Institute.

“A diet including chicken and pork, but no dairy or beef, has lower greenhouse gas emissions than a vegetarian diet that includes milk and cheese…”.

The Breakthrough Institute

Becoming another consumer that stops buying beef is the strongest action you can take to eliminate the emissions from your diet. Plant-based foods are always less resource intensive than dairy, including milk and cheese. So getting as close to a vegan diet as you can is the climate goal. Do what makes sense for your lifestyle, taste, and appetite, and as always, eat healthy and in moderation.

Next Up: Climate Action in 2024 – Day 34: Switch to Nondairy Alternatives

Howard Creel

#rescuethatfrog
Email: rescuethatfrog@gmail.com