.100 billionj gallons of water, enough to supply all the homes in New England
for almost 4 months.

.1.5 billion pounds of crops otherwise fed to livestock, enough to feed the
state of New Mexico for more than a year;

.70 million gallons of gas-- enough to fuel all the cars of Canada and Mexico
combined with plenty to spare;

.3 million acres of land, an area more than twice the size of Delaware;

.33 tons of antibiotics.

.If everyone went vegetarian just for one day, the U.S. would prevent:

.Greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to 1.2 million tons of CO2, as much as
produced by all of France;

.3 million tons of soil erosion and $70 million in resulting economic damages;

.4.5 million tons of animal excrement;

.Almost 7 tons of ammonia emissions, a major air pollutant.

.My favorite statistic is this; According to Environmental Defense, if every
American skipped one meal of chickin per week and substituted vegetarian
foods instead, the carbon dioxide savings would be the same as taking more
than half a million cars off U.S. roads. See how easy it is to make an impact?
,

Globally we feed 756 million tons of grain to farmed animal. As Princeton
bioethicist Peter Singer notes in his new book, if we fed that grain to the 1.4
billion people who are living in abjhect poverty, each of them would be
provided more than half a ton of grain, or about 3 pounds of grain/day--that,s
twice the grain they would need to survive. And that doesn,t even include the 225 million tons of soy that are produced every year, almost all which is fed to
farmed animals. He write, "The world is not running out of food. The
problem is that we -- the relatively affluent--have found a way to consume four
or five times as much food as would be possible, if we were to eat the crops we
grow directly."

A resent United Nations report titled Livestocks Long Shadow concluded that
the meat industry causes almost 40% more greenhouse gas emmissions than all
the worlds transportation systems--that,s all the cars and trucks, SUVs, planes and ships in the world combined. The report also concluded that factory farming
is one of the biggest contributors to the most serious environmental problems
at every level--local and global.

Researchers at the University of Chicago concluded that switching from
standard American diet to vegan diet is more effective in the fight against
global warming than switching from a standard American car to a hybrid.

In it,s report, the U.N. found that the meat industry causes local and global
enmvironmental problems even beyond global warming. It said that the meat
industry should be a main focus in every discussion of land degradation,
climate change and air pollution, water shortages and pollution, and loss
of biodiversity.

Unattributed statistics were calculated from scientific reports by Noam Mohr, a
physictist with New York University Polytecnic Institute>
Kathy Freston (writing for the Huffinton Post)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/11/2009 07:18AM by riverhousebill.

its staggering to have statistics show simple day to day things that can make a difference

...Jodi, the banana eating buddhist

Hey, can you link to your source so I can post that around?

CB I got that article out of Greenfuse a local paper here in northern Ca.
by Kathy Freston she write for a lot of papers and the Huffington Post.


Livestock destroy the environment, so fill your bowl with veggies instead of veal. Tools
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It's a little hard to take in when thinking of a small chick hatching from her fragile egg. How can an animal, so seemingly insignificant against the vastness of the earth, give off so much greenhouse gas as to change the global climate? The answer is in their sheer numbers. The United States alone slaughters more than 10 billion land animals every year, all to sustain a meat-ravenous culture that can barely conceive of a time not long ago when "a chicken in every pot" was considered a luxury. Land animals raised for food make up a staggering 20% of the entire land animal biomass of the earth. We are eating our planet to death. What we're seeing is just the beginning, too. Meat consumption has increased five-fold in the past fifty years, and is expected to double again in the next fifty.

It sounds like a lot of bad news, but in fact it's quite the opposite. It means we have a powerful new weapon to use in addressing the most serious environmental crisis ever to face humanity. The Prius was an important step forward, but how often are people in the market for a new car? Now that we know a greener diet is even more effective than a greener car, we can make a difference at every single meal, simply by leaving the animals off of our plates. Who would have thought: what's good for our health is also good for the health of the planet!

Going veg provides more bang for your buck than driving a Prius. Plus, that bang comes a lot faster. The Prius cuts emissions of carbon dioxide, which spreads its warming effect slowly over a century. A big chunk of the problem with farmed animals, on the other hand, is methane, a gas which cycles out of the atmosphere in just a decade. That means less meat consumption quickly translates into a cooler planet.

Not just a cooler planet, also a cleaner one. Animal agriculture accounts for most of the water consumed in this country, emits two-thirds of the world's acid-rain-causing ammonia, and it the world's largest source of water pollution -- killing entire river and marine ecosystems, destroying coral reefs, and of course, making people sick. Try to imagine the prodigious volumes of manure churned out by modern American farms: 5 million tons a day, more than a hundred times that of the human population, and far more than our land can possibly absorb. The acres and acres of cesspools stretching over much of our countryside, polluting the air and contaminating our water, make the Exxon Valdez oil spill look minor in comparison. All of which we can fix surprisingly easily, just by putting down our chicken wings and reaching for a veggie burger.

Doing so has never been easier. Recent years have seen an explosion of environmentally-friendly vegetarian foods. Even chains like Ruby Tuesday, Johnny Rockets, and Burger King offer delicious veggie burgers and supermarket refrigerators are lined with heart-healthy creamy soymilk and tasty veggie deli slices. Vegetarian foods have become staples at environmental gatherings, and garnered celebrity advocates like Bill Maher, Alec Baldwin, Paul McCartney, and of course Leonardo DiCaprio. Just as the Prius showed us that we each have in our hands the power to make a difference against a problem that endangers the future of humanity, going vegetarian gives us a new way to dramatically reduce our dangerous emissions that is even more effective, easier to do, more accessible to everyone and certainly goes better with french fries.

Ever-rising temperatures, melting ice caps, spreading tropical diseases, stronger hurricanes ... So, what are you do doing for dinner tonight? Check out www.VegCooking.com for great ideas, free recipes, meal plans, and more! Check out the environmental section of www.GoVeg.com for a lot more information about the harmful effect of meat-eating on the environment.

My advice (to myself only....what you do is your business)
is to quit worrying and spending time (it's precious, isn't it?) on
anything we can't directly do something about. Spend your time on
yourself.....WY

Wheatgrass Yogi Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My advice (to myself only....what you do is your
> business)
> is to quit worrying and spending time (it's
> precious, isn't it?) on
> anything we can't directly do something about.
> Spend your time on
> yourself.....WY


My bussness I think is to do what I can to reduce my carbon imprint,
What are you talking of that we can do nothing about Im wondering?
If there is hope no need to worry, no hope then why worry?

riverhousebill Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My bussness I think is to do what I can to
> reduce my carbon imprint,
Bill....If that's the way you see it, then go
for it.

> What are you talking of that we can do nothing
> about Im wondering?
For example....Suppose I gave up my car, and
started driving an electric Golf Cart, as many people, where I live,
do. How much help to the Carbon Imprint would that be? You could
worry yourself crazy over things like this....WY

monkey do monkey see.


Hundredth Monkey Phenomenon | The Hundredth Monkey Phenomenon
100 of those freaking critters, and it turns out to be a cool concept. The hundredth monkey phenomenon refers to a sudden spontaneous and mysterious leap of consciousness


....Suppose I gave up my car, and
started driving an electric Golf Cart, as many people, where I live,
do. How much help to the Carbon Imprint would that be?

Wheatgrass, that is not easy math, I cant ansewer that, but no doubt it has helped some. driving an electric car is one of many options for reduction.
It is the people that are the motive forces, its our spud.

If I felt I could not make change, it would be a very sad world for me, but I know I can make a differance, and Im washing a potato with good water I hope, and waiting for those monkeys anytime now!
Planet Peace rhb

Ive been told that the monkey thing is a myth, but I still think we can
do all that needs to be done, only it will be a collective action.
good luck to all us monkeys.

riverhousebill Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> good luck to all us monkeys.
I should have posted this at "Quotes", but I
think it applies here....WY

"YOU ARE HERE TO ENABLE THE DIVINE PURPOSE OF THE UNIVERSE TO UNFOLD.
THAT'S HOW IMPORTANT YOU ARE!" -ECKHART TOLLE

What does that quote actually mean?

communitybuilder Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> What does that quote actually mean?
Whatever it means to you. Dive deep, and imagine
the highest thought about yourself....WY

I'd like to add my support of Rivers philosophy in regards to everyone making a difference with everything that they do. I would then also like to add an understanding that I have which resonated with something WY said, and that is...

You can consider the welfare of others in terms of the environment and aim to lower your carbon imprint, or you can look at the integration that the western world has with the third world, and donate to support them in a desire for balance, you can observe our endangered wildlife and take initiatives that protect their existance etc...

But in every case, some actions can and do have huge benifits, where others can be next to useless ( such as donating to organisations that are set up for third world support where the money gets intercepted along the way by corrupt officials etc, or when one addopts a practice such as using recycled toilet paper, which happens to have more energy wasted in the transportation of the paper overseas to be recycled and then returned to the consumer, than what it could ever hope to save by being of recycled material ).

What I believe is the "effecting" agent within any of these actions, is not only the actions which are partaken, but more importantly, the creative spark/idea/emotion which motivates it. I believe that the intention behind the actions are more important than the actions themselves, and that when people allow their motives to be aligned with more compassionate considerations, that the consequences will align themselves accordingly.