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Comment by andy_ppp | Hacker News Reader

Sure, but I think cows producing methane is probably more harmful and more immediately easy to fix (i.e. I'd rather go on holiday than eat meat). The Earth can probably support air travel if we can get rid of most other sources of greenhouse gases.

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There may be solutions to that in the form of feed additives to reduce methane emissions.[1] But as that source notes "methane from animal agriculture is just 5 percent of the total greenhouse gases produced in the United States -- much, much more comes from the energy and transportation sectors", so I'm a skeptical to the suggestion that it is more harmful and easier to fix.

[1]: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/06/190617164642.h...

This is an excellent diagram that breaks everything down [1]. It actually shows you are probably right, meat vs air production, meat is 2.5% and air is at 3.3% of greenhouse gases.

[1] https://static.skepticalscience.com/pics/us-flowchart.jpg

Livestock emit methane (although there are potential solutions for that), and they also can help development of topsoil, and sequester a lot of carbon, when they're grazing and not force fed corn and grain in a feedlot.

Also note that North America used to have as many as 60 million Bison, versus about 95 million cattle today. And cattle emit about as much or less methane than bison do, per animal.

https://daily.jstor.org/can-cows-help-mitigate-climate-chang...

Methane is not long lasting unlike CO2.

Cow worries are just smoke to hide the real issue that is the fossil fuels, specially boats and planes.

What's easier to do telling people to stop eating steak, or getting governments to reduce their biggest "sponsors" earnings?

Doesn't methane usually have a short lifespan in the atmosphere?

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