Walking: Worse for Global Warming

[Jerkapotamus]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk /science/article2195538.ece

Walking does more than driving to cause global warming, a leading environmentalist has calculated.

Food production is now so energy-intensive that more carbon is emitted providing a person with enough calories to walk to the shops than a car would emit over the same distance. The climate could benefit if people avoided exercise, ate less and became couch potatoes. Provided, of course, they remembered to switch off the TV rather than leaving it on standby.

The sums were done by Chris Goodall, campaigning author of How to Live a Low-Carbon Life, based on the greenhouse gases created by intensive beef production. "Driving a typical UK car for 3 miles [4.8km] adds about 0.9 kg [2lb] of CO2 to the atmosphere," he said, a calculation based on the Government's official fuel emission figures. "If you walked instead, it would use about 180 calories. You'd need about 100g of beef to replace those calories, resulting in 3.6kg of emissions, or four times as much as driving.

"The troubling fact is that taking a lot of exercise and then eating a bit more food is not good for the global atmosphere. Eating less and driving to save energy would be better."

Mr Goodall, Green Party parliamentary candidate for Oxford West & Abingdon, is the latest serious thinker to turn popular myths about the environment on their head.

Catching a diesel train is now twice as polluting as travelling by car for an average family, the Rail Safety and Standards Board admitted recently. Paper bags are worse for the environment than plastic because of the extra energy needed to manufacture and transport them, the Government says.

Fresh research published in New Scientistlast month suggested that 1kg of meat cost the Earth 36kg in global warming gases. The figure was based on Japanese methods of industrial beef production but Mr Goodall says that farming techniques are similar throughout the West.

What if, instead of beef, the walker drank a glass of milk? The average person would need to drink 420ml - three quarters of a pint - to recover the calories used in the walk. Modern dairy farming emits the equivalent of 1.2kg of CO2 to produce the milk, still more pollution than the car journey.

Cattle farming is notorious for its perceived damage to the environment, based on what scientists politely call "methane production" from cows. The gas, released during the digestive process, is 21 times more harmful than CO2 . Organic beef is the most damaging because organic cattle emit more methane.

Michael O'Leary, boss of the budget airline Ryanair, has been widely derided after he was reported to have said that global warming could be solved by massacring the world's cattle. "The way he is running around telling people they should shoot cows," Lawrence Hunt, head of Silverjet, another budget airline, told the Commons Environmental Audit Committee. "I do not think you can really have debates with somebody with that mentality."

But according to Mr Goodall, Mr O'Leary may have a point. "Food is more important [to Britain's greenhouse emissions] than aircraft but there is no publicity," he said. "Associated British Foods isn't being questioned by MPs about energy.

"We need to become accustomed to the idea that our food production systems are equally damaging. As the man from Ryanair says, cows generate more emissions than aircraft. Unfortunately, perhaps, he is right. Of course, this doesn't mean we should always choose to use air or car travel instead of walking. It means we need urgently to work out how to reduce the greenhouse gas intensity of our foodstuffs."

Simply cutting out beef, or even meat, however, would be too modest a change. The food industry is estimated to be responsible for a sixth of an individual's carbon emissions, and Britain may be the worst culprit.

"This is not just about flying your beans from Kenya in the winter," Mr Goodall said. "The whole system is stuffed with energy and nitrous oxide emissions. The UK is probably the worst country in the world for this.

"We have industrialised our food production. We use an enormous amount of processed food, like ready meals, compared to most countries. Three quarters of supermarkets' energy is to refrigerate and freeze food prepared elsewhere.

A chilled ready meal is a perfect example of where the energy is wasted. You make the meal, then use an enormous amount of energy to chill it and keep it chilled through warehousing and storage."

The ideal diet would consist of cereals and pulses. "This is a route which virtually nobody, apart from a vegan, is going to follow," Mr Goodall said. But there are other ways to reduce the carbon footprint. "Don't buy anything from the supermarket," Mr Goodall said, "or anything that's travelled too far."

I thought it was quite an interesting take on Global Warming. Be the laziest you can be Newgrounds.

[IllustriousPotentate]

We're exacerbating global warming by walking? Or any other exercise?

[ImaSmartass2]

Okay this is getting retarded...If that was true then the earth would have burned out hundreds of years ago..

[K-RadPie]

I hope no one is actually gonna take the advice, and become a couch potato just because walking is "worse for global warming."

[animehater]

At 8/6/07 01:32 PM, K-RadPie wrote: I hope no one is actually gonna take the advice, and become a couch potato just because walking is "worse for global warming."

Isn't just exhaling bad for global warming?

[Modern-Hippie]

At 8/6/07 12:59 PM, ImaSmartass2 wrote: Okay this is getting retarded...If that was true then the earth would have burned out hundreds of years ago..

I'd definitely agree.

Also, this article seems to be talking about carbon intensive food production methods, and not so much about walking vs. driving which is an entirely different subject. Furthermore, I'd like to know how he crunched his numbers because it seems to contradict everything I've learned in t least 27 credit hours worth of classes ranging from chemistry to environmental biology. Chemistry being one of the more important and relevant ones. Maybe this guy has ulterior motives for publishing something like this. It sounds sketch.

[K-RadPie]

Isn't just exhaling bad for global warming?

It would seem like the only way to stop "global warming" is to kill yourself. But OH NOEZ, muscle relaxation after death releases methane!

[Luxury-Yacht]

At 8/6/07 01:39 PM, Modern-Hippie wrote:

At 8/6/07 12:59 PM, ImaSmartass2 wrote: Okay this is getting retarded...If that was true then the earth would have burned out hundreds of years ago..

Well, food production has only recently become so industrialized, making it less harmful to manufacture food back then.

Also, this article seems to be talking about carbon intensive food production methods, and not so much about walking vs. driving which is an entirely different subject. Furthermore, I'd like to know how he crunched his numbers because it seems to contradict everything I've learned in t least 27 credit hours worth of classes ranging from chemistry to environmental biology. Chemistry being one of the more important and relevant ones. Maybe this guy has ulterior motives for publishing something like this. It sounds sketch.

I think it's a stretch as well. He appears to be calculating caloric values and turning them into foods that require various manufacturing methods versus car exhaust. If manufacturing is to be taken into account for food production, then transportation production waste must be accounted for as well. Therefore, we must take into account pollution and energy consumption expended by oil drilling, oil refinery, oil transportation, car manufacturing, car part disposal, etc.

Then, should society heed these findings anyway and drive more and walk less, then we have more traffic, and therefore slower transportation- congestion in roads leads to higher numbers of traffic jams, longer commute times, increased oil consumption, etc. These factors would lead to increased carbon emissions that I doubt anyone would be able to project due to the possible amounts o increased traffic that vary. Also, the huge array of car mileage efficiencies make his calculation is probably inaccurate. Cars range from anywhere from around 10 to around 60 miles per gallon, after all.

Besides all that, people that drive as opposed to walk still consume about the same amount of food. Most Americans consume plenty of excess carbohydrates and calories regardless of lifestyle, making the logic behind the argument flawed.

[SolInvictus]

the walking itself is not the problem seeing as most people eat the same amount whether they walk or not. the difference is that one becomes a fat bastard and the other doesn't.

i wonder if the emissions created by hospitals who treat the fat bastard due to obesity related problems are worst than vehicle traffic?

[EKublai]

Fortunately we've found ways of dealing with both problems
Wired is truly the best resource in the world.

How Stinky Gas Can Save The World

and the cow problem. I love option #2

Belching Bovines Are Harming the Environment: How to Clear the Air

[Modern-Hippie]

At 8/6/07 02:50 PM, Luxury-Yacht wrote:

:...flawed.

I couldn't say it any better. ;)

A lot of it does have to do with the lifestyle choices people make since that is the most immediate area they can have a direct effect on. I would also like to know how cycling changes the equation.

[damionford]

At 8/6/07 12:59 PM, ImaSmartass2 wrote: Okay this is getting retarded...If that was true then the earth would have burned out hundreds of years ago..

literally that article is biased abd full of bullshit people have been walking for millions of years and the problem of global warming haden't happened untill after cars where made

[Proteas]

At 8/6/07 12:38 PM, IllustriousPotentate wrote: What are we supposed to do, then?

There's only one thing you can do, my friend... LIFT YOUR HEAD UP HIGH AND BLOW YOUR BRAINS OUT!!!!

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

[damionford]

At 8/6/07 03:18 PM, Proteas wrote:

At 8/6/07 12:38 PM, IllustriousPotentate wrote: What are we supposed to do, then?

There's only one thing you can do, my friend... LIFT YOUR HEAD UP HIGH AND BLOW YOUR BRAINS OUT!!!!

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Nice Bloodhound Gang refrence

[Bolo]

At 8/6/07 03:22 PM, damionford wrote:

At 8/6/07 03:18 PM, Proteas wrote:

At 8/6/07 12:38 PM, IllustriousPotentate wrote: What are we supposed to do, then?

There's only one thing you can do, my friend... LIFT YOUR HEAD UP HIGH AND BLOW YOUR BRAINS OUT!!!!

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Nice Bloodhound Gang refrence

Sorry to break the flow of this thread further, but that band is simply horrible.

[SmackBang]

At 8/6/07 03:53 PM, Bolo wrote:

Sorry to break the flow of this thread further, but that band is simply horrible.

Seconded.

[tony4moroney]

At 8/6/07 02:50 PM, Luxury-Yacht wrote: the environmentalist idiot was flawed

amen to that

At 8/6/07 04:23 PM, SmackBang wrote:

At 8/6/07 03:53 PM, Bolo wrote:

Sorry to break the flow of this thread further, but that band is simply horrible.

Seconded.

i remember they made one catchy tune, but yes theyre a shit band.

[200monkeys]

Articles paid for by car and gas companies at their finest XD

[Cuppa-LettuceNog]

Ah. So according to the report, the only thing that people ever eat in their lives is beef.

[Git]

Watch out guys, the government is going to tax you based on your oxygen intake!

While I find this study believable, I could care less about Global Warming. If it isn't GW it's something else....

[idiot-buster]

dats newz to me

[Begoner]

At 8/6/07 01:34 PM, animehater wrote: Isn't just exhaling bad for global warming?

In a single day, you produce about 0.750 kilograms of carbon dioxide by breathing. That's the amount of carbon dioxide produced by driving a typical car for 2 miles.