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Green Diet for a Green Home

Green Diet for a Green Home

You've jumped on the locavore bandwagon, buying your veggies, eggs, cheese and whatever else you can get from local producers. Think you're doing all the right things when it comes to greening your home by eating right? Well, you could be going a step further.

According to a new study out of Carnegie Mellon University, the transport of food only counts for 11% of food-associated greenhouse gas emissions. It's production that's causing the real problem. The byproducts of fertilizer and animal digestion (methane gas) account for greater levels of emissions.

Researchers looked at the entire life-cycle of food, during all stages of growth and transport in the U.S. (using Department of Commerce data) and calculated that the average U.S. household generates 8.1 metric tons (t) of greenhouse gases (in CO2 equivalents) annually as a result of food consumption.

What do their finding mean practically? That we can further reduce our carbon footprint by reducing the amount of beef and dairy we consume—the study claims its actually more important than just eating locally. Sad news for all the steak and milk lovers out there—but hey...you should be eating a balanced diet anyway! Has anyone changed their diet in order to be greener at home? [Treehugger.com]

Posted: 5/9/08
Beadwild

I was so glad to see this article. I stopped eating meat in 1990 when I first heard of the amount of the destructive emissions we could reduce. It puzzles me when people ask me "What do you eat?" We have been led to believe that fresh vegetables are too time consuming to fix quickly, yet steaming vegetables often takes less time than a microwave meal. One can thow some pasta into a pot and just before it is cooked add broccoli, greens , or as much of whatever you like. It is ready in minutes. This is fast food at its best!