Carbon13
Well-Known Member
to some degree though, I think it's a false dichotomy since most of that water is used to support production of plant crops to feed the livestock - and if we weren't eating meat, our own consumption of plant products would increase - so we'd still use the water to grow the crops
Plus really, isn't water pretty much a renewable resource? Maybe that's part of the reason the alarm bells aren't going off.
Don't mean to be a crazy alarmist, but the amount of water used to support crops is far less than the water to used to support meat. A gallon of milk requires 1000 gallons of water to produce. A single hamburger requires 6,600 gallons of water to produce. A single cow eats 150 pounds of plants a day. Basically, meat needs a ****load more resources to make.
Freshwater to a degree is renewable but not in the way most think. Much of the water we get today comes from underground aquifers. while shallower ones can recharge, we are generally depleting them faster than they are able to. This could be a real issue in the future and already is in parts of California.
In the end, cows are worse for the environment than oil. Who knew?! I could care less really. I'll probably continue to eat meat but I just wonder why this isn't talked about more? Seems like we tar and feather the oil industry but never target agriculture or fishing which is out of whack.