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Cats and Dogs Contribute Significantly To Climate Change, Says UCLA Study (patch.com)
New submitter Zorro shares a report from Patch.com: When it comes to global warming, Fido and Fluffy are part of the problem, a new study by UCLA indicates. Pet ownership in the United States creates about 64 million tons of carbon dioxide a year, UCLA researchers found. That's the equivalent of driving 13.6 million cars for a year. The problem lies with the meat-filled diets of kitties and pooches, according to the study by UCLA geography professor Gregory Okin. Dogs and cats are responsible for 25 to 30 percent of the impacts of meat production in the United States, said Orkin. Compared to a plant-based diet, meat production "requires more energy, land and water and has greater environmental consequences in terms of erosion, pesticides and waste," the study found. And what goes in, must come out. In terms of waste, Okin noted, feeding pets also leads to about 5.1 million tons of feces every year, roughly equivalent to the total trash production of Massachusetts. The study has been published in the journal PLOS One.
How much CO2 does an average person produce, compared to a dog ?
Pets used to eat mostly left-overs from their owner's plates. Then we started producing food specially for them, which is one of the main reasons hat they live about twice as long as they used to.
Having said that, the stuff in cat and dog food tens to be the stuff that humans don't want. Mechanically recovered head meat, the kind of stuff that only KFC would try to feed you out of one of their buckets.
And my cat loves fruit and vegetables. Western cat food seems to be mostly meat, but Japanese cat food has a lot more fruit, vegetables and seafood in it.
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SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
The meat we feed to animals are cut-offs that don't make it into hotdogs. It has its own separate grade, "canning grade".
Meat is not grown *for* pets, although I'm sure there's some fru-fru company that does it. As such, the pets are eating waste, and the CO2 budget is zero.
No kidding.
Limiting people to a bland, tasteless nutrient-rich food paste of exactly the right quantity and monitoring them 24/7 so they don't take risks or do anything "wrong" would also help prolong life, but it would also be a living-hell not worth living in....