The environmental benefits of vegetarianism

By Gabe Bronk and Arthur Su/ Special To The Tab

 

 

Vegetarianism is not only a response to the inhumane practices of factory farms; it is also a way to conserve natural resources, improve the environment and benefit human health.

The meat industry is very wasteful of natural resources. An inherent problem with eating meat is that an animal must be fed roughly ten pounds of plants to produce one pound of meat. Therefore, much more food is consumed to support the animals than would be needed if more people were vegetarians. Seventy percent of the grain grown in the US is used to feed livestock. Because of the growth of so much animal feed, half the water consumed in the U.S. is used by the meat industry, and our groundwater is being withdrawn 25% faster than it is being replenished. In the High Plains states from South Dakota to New Mexico, it is projected that the aquifer will be depleted in 60 years. Erosion and nutrient depletion caused by animal feed production and overgrazing by livestock are destroying vast areas of arable land.

 

We are currently in an oil crisis, and the meat industry is exacerbating it. Eight times as much fossil fuel energy is used in the production of animal protein as is used in plant protein production due to the fuel required to manufacture fertilizers and pesticides for animal feed, to operate farming machinery, for transportation and for irrigation. Four hundred gallons of fossil fuels are used to produce food for the average meat-eating American each year.

A meat eater requires two to four times more farmland than a vegetarian. To make room for enough farmland, the meat industry constantly destroys vital ecosystems, thus taking away the habitats of myriad species and reducing biodiversity. The vast Amazon rainforest is rapidly being destroyed to make way for ranching and growing animal feed and will be gone by the end of this century if the current rate of destruction continues. Do you want to let this happen?

The damage to the environment does not stop at animal feed production. The plants are fed to the livestock, which, after digesting the food, produce 1.37 billion tons of manure in the U.S. annually. The manure often spills out of open-air storage pits and into waterways, accelerating the growth of algae. When the algae die, their decomposition depletes the water of oxygen. This causes the deaths of millions of fish. Manure also releases ammonia into the air, which can contaminate rain, killing forests. Fumes from factory farms cause people in the area to experience respiratory problems and other ailments. Nitrates leak from manure into community drinking water, causing serious human health problems.

The meat industry contributes significantly to global warming. Methane, a greenhouse gas, is released by bacteria in the rumens of cattle and in the manure of many farm animals. Furthermore, forests and grasslands that would absorb high amounts of carbon dioxide are cleared to make way for farmland. To make matters worse, the enormous fires used to burn down these forests release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

The fishing industry also contributes to environmental degradation. Many species are being fished faster than they can reproduce. 15 of the 17 major ocean fisheries are exhausted or overexploited, so many marine food webs are depleted, and ocean ecosystems are seriously damaged. Myriads of other animals are accidentally caught and killed in the nets, such as nearly 300,000 whales, dolphins and porpoises killed each year. Pulling bottom trawls across the seafloor devastates habitats including coral reefs.

You can help save the environment and keep yourself healthy at the same time; according to the American Dietetic Association and Dietitians of Canada, vegan and vegetarian diets are appropriate for all stages of life as long as the vegetarian gets all necessary nutrition, which is easy to do. Visit www.veganhealth.org for nutrition information.

A well-planned vegetarian or vegan diet offers many health benefits. Vegetarians have lower blood cholesterol levels, lower rates hypertension and lower rates of death from ischemic heart disease due to the lower levels of saturated fat found in animal products and the higher levels of antioxidants found in fruits and vegetables. Fruits, vegetables, nuts, legumes and whole grains, all staples of a vegetarian diet, provide better nutrition and help prevent many diseases.

Spurred by this knowledge as well as by the meat industry's brutality towards animals, we became vegetarian/vegan and have examined and promoted vegetarianism as a project for our biology class at Newton North High School.

Consider the possibilities. There are many delicious and varied foods that do not contain animal products. We're not just talking lettuce and bananas; think grilled veggie burger or bean burrito. If becoming vegetarian seems like a difficult task, try reducing your consumption of meat gradually; cut out meat one day a week at first. Soon you will have a healthier diet and be saving natural resources and the environment. If you do become vegetarian, email us at vegetarianism@comcast.net to let us know that this article had the desired effect.

More information at http://www.sierraclub.com/factoryfarms www.veganoutreach.org/whyvegan and Pamela Rice, 101 Reasons Why I'm a Vegetarian. Lantern Books, 2005.

Gabe Bronk and Arthur Su will be seniors at Newton North High School this fall. Members of the award-winning school science team, they are passionate about environmental protection.

This article is archived at www.greendecade.org/tabarchive.asp.

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Biodiversity and Health: Locally and Beyond

By Yi Li

 

Dr. Edward O. Wilson, distinguished biologist and researcher at Harvard University, wrote nearly two decades ago that “biological diversity must be treated more seriously as a global resource.”  Wilson realized that the depletion of organismal variation was leading to a host of environmental and economic problems  Many scientists today share Wilson’s concerns about biodiversity; and this concern has only grown in the past few decades.  Biodiversity, defined as variation in life at all levels of biological organization, is quickly diminishing, and this erosion is being catalyzed by human pollution, consumption, and exploitation of our resources. 

In this area, one prominent example of the effects of loss in biodiversity can easily be observed.  Every fall in New England, incidences of Lyme disease increase as more people head outdoors to enjoy the weather and fall foliage.  Lyme disease is spread by small insects called ticks, and the disease is more prevalent in the northeastern United States because disease-bearing ticks and animals that serve as reservoirs for these ticks have become more prevalent as well.  This increase in the tick population and their hosts can be attributed to a recent decrease in their natural predators.   In the northeast, ticks are often carried by white-footed mice, and the predators of these mice – wolves and wildcats – have decreased in number over the years.  Additionally, the number of other small animals that may serve as targets for tick bites have decreased as well.  The synthesis of all of these factors leads to a rise in the number of cases of Lyme disease in the human population, serving as just one example of how the maintenance of biodiversity in our environment is so crucial to everyday health. 

Losses in biodiversity cause much environmental instability.  My arguments for the importance of biodiversity in health for human populations come mainly from two fields: a scientific argument based on the importance of environmental stability, and an economic argument based on the cost-effectiveness of preventative biodiversity measures. 

In scientific terms, throughout evolutionary history, when organisms become extinct or move away from their environments of origin, parasitic agents take over the niche that these organisms had inhabited.  These parasites often find new hosts, and when they jump from one host organism to another, new diseases begin to emerge.  Parasitologists postulate that this is the mechanism of emergence for new human diseases like West Nile Virus and the Avian Flu.  Currently, researchers still have a poor understanding of the exact roles that various identified parasites play in different diseases.  Research is still ongoing and is being aided by advances in fields such as molecular taxonomy.

The importance of biodiversity can best be illustrated through case-studies of diseases that have spread among human populations due to disruptions in biodiversity.  Deforestation in the Amazon and in remote regions of Africa has exposed people to diseases that originally inhabited wildlife; this is the proposed origin of diseases such as AIDS and Ebola.  Research by Dr. Peter Daszak, of the Consortium for Conservation Medicine, has also identified a connection between Chinese horseshoe bats and the outbreak of SARS in Asia.  Most poignantly, we may look back in history and see that the introduction of smallpox, typhus and measles by Spanish conquistadors to South American natives in the 15th century resulted in the deaths of nearly 50 million.  These examples illustrate how the introduction of disease-causing agents into environments where they were previously nonexistent can have profound consequences.

From an economic perspective, vast amounts of money and economic resources can be saved by taking a preventative approach to the loss in biodiversity, instead of a reactive one.  When SARS broke out in Asia, the economic losses from trade and travel totaled around $50 billion – a figure that hugely impacted the developing economies of the countries affected.  On top of that, 800 people died from the disease.  The costs of Lyme disease treatments in the United States total to nearly $500 million each year.  One can only imagine the magnitude of these figures for diseases such as AIDS where cost of care is staggering and new transmissions remain undiminished. 

A vastly better use of these economic resources is to take a preventative approach to these problems.  Scientists advocate for tougher regulations on trade, agriculture and travel as methods of reducing the spread of disease-causing agents and preventing the jump of diseases from wildlife to humans.  By protecting the environment, we prevent the catastrophic consequences of emerging disease and spend well below the current costs of reactive measures.  All of these benefits come in addition to the inherent benefits of preserving our natural resources and preventing organisms from extinction.  Many yet-unstudied and undiscovered organisms may hold the secrets to medical cures.  At one point, scientists believed that the Australian gastric brooding frog held the secrets to anti-ulcer treatments because these frogs incubate their young in their stomach only after shutting off digestive acids. Tragically, the frogs became extinct before scientists could study them – their secrets and mysteries died along with them.

As citizens of the metropolitan Boston area, with so many educational resources, we have many opportunities to learn more about the issues surrounding biodiversity.  The Harvard Center for Health and the Global Environment (chge.med.harvard.edu) and Wildlife Trust (www.wildlifetrust.org) are great online resources for more information on research, recommendations, and upcoming events.  We must also remain aware of legislation that will affect biodiversity locally and beyond.  Our actions begin with becoming aware of what organizations and companies to support, what initiatives to advocate for, and what political agendas to push for.  This approach to biodiversity maintenance requires a long-term vision, but the action must begin now.  We must take a stance on this issue before further diseases emerge as a consequence of our actions and before many more resources are depleted in the process.

Yi Li is a first-year student at Harvard Medical School. She served for two years as Editor-in-Chief of Duke University's undergraduate Journal of Science and Technology.

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Energy Efficiency Makes Cents

By Jill Hahn

 

Here in Newton, we take pride in being a "green" city, mainly due to our concerns about global warming and the long-term health of our citizens. But improving the energy efficiency of buildings is also a great way to save money. Corporations are beginning to realize this. Bank of America's new headquarters in New York City, which will be the most environmentally friendly skyscraper ever built when it opens in 2008, has been designed with resource-saving measures from basement to the 54th floor roof. Even so, the building's eco-friendly features add up to less than one percent of the project's total price, and since water and energy usage is decreased by 40%, tenants will reap savings for years to come. (from Wright L. The world's coolest skyscraper. OnEarth 2005; Winter: 12-13.)

State governments, including our own, have begun to come to the same realization. In February 2006, Massachusetts passed "An Act Relative to Contracts for Energy Management," making it easier for municipalities to contract for work that will improve their buildings while saving them money at the same time. The new procurement rules encourage municipalities to invest in energy conservation measures by entering into performance contracts with an Energy Services Company (ESCO). Using conventional procurement, a city has to hire service providers (auditors, engineers, architects, general and subcontractors) and separately procure equipment. An ESCO is a one-stop shopping alternative. It first performs an energy audit of the public buildings. It then recommends energy conservation measures - such as automatic light switches, new boilers, new windows or roofs, improved plumbing - and estimates how much energy the city would save if such measures were put in place. It finally acts as the general contractor for the city, purchasing and installing the energy conserving measures selected by the city. And here's the hook: the ESCO guarantees a certain amount of energy use reduction. If it fails to meet its guarantee, the ESCO pays the city for the extra energy usage.

Financing is usually done through a tax-exempt lease provided by a bank, rather than through the bonding municipalities usually use to pay for such work. Passing a bond is  a political act, with the long approval process that implies, and it adds to a city's debt burden.

Tax-exempt leases do not. Monthly lease payments are made by the city to the bank, with energy cost savings providing the cash needed to pay the leases. Because of the way the performance contract is structured, the only way savings would not equal or exceed the monthly payments would be if utility costs skyrocketed or if energy usage increased unpredictably and dramatically.

In 2005, Belmont became the first town in Massachusetts to contract with an ESCO for a project that involved both school and government buildings. The contract cost the city $1.7 million, and guaranteed the town at least $200,000 in cost savings over each of the next 10 years. ESCOs are able to make such guarantees because they couple measures that bring quick savings, such as energy-efficient lighting, with projects that slowly pay for themselves, such as replacing boilers. The guaranteed savings enabled Belmont to fund improvements to six schools and five government buildings out of its operating budget rather than as capital expenses. "I felt that I probably couldn't have sold this solely on the basis that it was environmentally friendly," Selectman Paul Solomon said. "But I did think that I could sell it on the basis that it would save money."

And that's the beauty of this approach. Energy costs in Newton's aging public buildings are currently rising at a rate of 40% per year. One only needs to compare the energy cost per square foot of newly renovated Newton South High School ($1.61) to that of, say, Zervas Elementary School ($4.34) to get a hint of the sort of savings the city could realize if it entered into its own performance contract with an ESCO. And a wonderful side effect of all this fiscal responsibility would be the savings we realized in greenhouse gas emissions and pollution, savings that will benefit all of us long after the tax-exempt lease is paid for and forgotten.

 Jill Hahn,  jkkhahn@comcast.net, a Newton Highlands resident, is a biologist, a writer, and a mom. All three roles contribute to her interest in environmental issues. She is co-chairing a local effort to educate the city of Newton on the benefits of performance contracting as a means of improving our public buildings.

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