foods

Plant-Based Foods And CO2 Emissions | Earth Wise

September 9, 2022 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

We often hear how eating locally-sourced food is a way to minimize the carbon footprint of our diet. But from a climate impact perspective, this only has a significant impact if transportation is responsible for a large portion of a food’s final carbon footprint. In many cases, the greenhouse gas emissions related to transportation make up only a small portion of the total emissions from food, and what we eat is far more important.

In general, beef and lamb have the biggest climate footprint per gram of protein. Plant-based foods tend to have the smallest impact. Pork and chicken are somewhere in the middle.

According to new research, U.S. food production could reduce its agricultural carbon footprint between 2.5% and 13.5% by embracing plant-based alternatives to beef. The study, from researchers at Cornell University, Johns Hopkins University, and international partners, found that most of the reduction would be achieved by decreasing the number of cows needed for beef production by two to twelve million animals. The research was recently published in the journal Lancet Planetary Health.

However, the researchers also found that acting to reduce climate change in this manner could have unintended consequences. For example, economic models from the research team show that the growth in popularity of plant-based beef could disrupt the agricultural workforce, threatening more than 1.5 million jobs.

But in the big picture, doing nothing will cost much more than doing something to slow climate change. Shifting diets away from meat and other animal products and towards more plant-based foods will help shrink carbon footprints and mitigate climate change. It’s a win-win for the planet and for human health.

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Plant-based ‘beef’ reduces CO2 but threatens ag jobs

Photo, posted November 27, 2018, courtesy of Sarah Stierch via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Progress On Artificial Photosynthesis | Earth Wise

August 8, 2022 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Photosynthesis is the process by which plants use the energy from sunlight to turn water and carbon dioxide into biomass and ultimately the foods we and other organisms eat. Scientists at the University of California Riverside and the University of Delaware have found a way to create food from water and carbon dioxide without using biological photosynthesis and without needing sunlight.

The research, recently published in the journal Nature Food, uses a two-step electrocatalytic process to convert carbon dioxide, electricity, and water into acetate, which is the primary component of vinegar. Food-producing microorganisms then consume the acetate in order to grow. Solar panels are used to generate the electricity to power the electrocatalysis. The result is a hybrid organic-inorganic system that is far more efficient in converting sunlight into food than biological photosynthesis.

The research showed that a wide range of food-producing organisms can be grown in the dark directly on the acetate output of the electrolyzer. These include green algae, yeast, and the fungal mycelium that produce mushrooms. Producing algae with this technology is about 4 times more energy efficient than growing it with photosynthesis. Yeast production is about 18 times more energy efficient than the typical method of cultivating it using sugar extracted from corn.

Artificial photosynthesis has the potential to liberate agriculture from its complete dependence on the sun, opening the door to a wide range of possibilities for growing food under the increasingly difficult conditions imposed by the changing climate.

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Artificial photosynthesis can produce food without sunshine

Photo, posted September 7, 2016, courtesy of Kevin Doncaster via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Coral Reefs And Ecosystem Services

October 18, 2021 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

A new study led by the University of British Columbia provides the first comprehensive look at what climate change, overfishing, and habitat destruction of coral reefs mean for their ecosystem services. For humans, this means how the global decline in coral reefs has affected their ability to provide essential benefits including food, livelihoods, and protection from storms.

The study found that global coverage of living corals has declined by about half since the 1950s and the diversity of reef species has declined by more than 60%. So, it is no surprise that there has been a significant loss in the ability of reefs to provide ecosystem services.

The study analyzed data from coral reef surveys around the world, fisheries catches, indigenous consumption, and more. Apart from the declines in reef coverage and biodiversity, the study found that fish catches on coral reefs peaked in 2002 and has steadily declined since then, despite increased fishing efforts.

The findings of the study led the researchers to conclude that continued degradation of coral reefs in the years to come threaten the well-being and sustainable development of millions of people in communities on the coast that depend on coral reefs. Fish and fisheries provide essential nutrients in places with few alternative sources of nutrition. Coral reef biodiversity and fisheries have added importance for indigenous communities, where important cultural relationships exist with reefs.

The study’s authors say that the results are a call to action. The level of destruction happening all over the world’s coral reefs is threatening people’s culture, their daily food, and their history. It is not just an environmental issue; it is a human rights issue.

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Photo, posted September 22, 2010, courtesy of David Burdick / NOAA Photo Library via Flickr.

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Sunscreen For Corals | Earth Wise

August 6, 2021 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Sunscreen from beachgoers entering ocean waters is one of the greatest threats to coral reefs and there are global efforts to reduce or eliminate the use of many of the most harmful chemicals people use to protect themselves from the sun’s rays. However, scientists at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute have found that some corals have a natural sunscreen of their own that helps protect them from the effects of climate change.

Hawaiian blue rice corals feature a deep blue pigment that is created by chromoprotein that filters out harmful ultraviolet radiation from the sun. UV damage has harmful impacts to reproduction in many coral species, but it appears not to have the same effect on blue rice coral.

In a study published in Scientific Reports, Smithsonian researchers studied the devastating effects that bleaching had on brown rice coral in the Hawaiian bleaching events of 2014 and 2015. During the same events, blue rice coral either recovered quickly or was not affected by the elevated ocean temperature at all.

The blue-pigmented corals had dramatically greater reproductive vigor than the brown-pigmented version. The key factor appears to be the sun-screening ability of the blue pigment in the particular symbiotic algae that lives inside the coral tissue known as zooxanthellae. The coral protects the algae and in turn the algae provide the coral with food in the form of sugars produced as a waste product from photosynthesis. In the case of the blue version, the algae also produce sunscreen for the coral.

By better understanding the role UV-protective pigments play in mitigating the adverse effects of climate change and warming oceans, scientists can learn why some species are better equipped to survive in a changing environment.

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Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute Scientists Find Corals’ Natural “Sunscreen” May Help Them Weather Climate Change

Photo, posted September 28, 2009, courtesy of Matt Kieffer via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Restoring Seagrass In Virginia | Earth Wise

December 10, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Seagrass is found in shallow waters in many parts of the world. They are plants with roots, stems, and leaves, and produce flowers and seeds. They can form dense underwater meadows that constitute some of the most productive ecosystems in the world. Seagrasses provide shelter and food to a diverse community of animals including tiny invertebrates, fish, crabs, turtles, marine mammals and birds.

In the late 1920s, a pathogen began killing seagrasses off the coast of Virginia. In 1933, a hurricane finished them off completely. For nearly 70 years thereafter, the bay bottoms of the Virginia coast were muddy and barren, essentially devoid of fish, shellfish, mollusks and other creatures that inhabit seagrass meadows. The local scallop industry was no more.

The largest seagrass restoration project ever attempted has changed all that. During the past 21 years, scientists and volunteers have spread more than 70 million eelgrass seeds within four previously barren seaside lagoons. This has spurred a natural propagation of meadows that have so for grown to almost 9,000 acres, the largest eelgrass habitat between North Carolina and Long Island Sound.

The long-term research conducted by the team from the University of Virginia shows that the success of the seagrass restoration project is improving water quality, substantially increasing the abundance of fish and shellfish in the bays, and capturing carbon from the water and atmosphere and storing it in the extensive root systems of the grasses and in the sediment below.

The study shows that marine restorations are possible on scales that contribute directly to human well-being.

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Some Good News: Seagrass Restored to Eastern Shore Bays is Flourishing

Photo, posted May 17, 2019, courtesy of Virginia Sea Grant via Flickr. Photo credit: Aileen Devlin | Virginia Sea Grant.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Foods of the Future? | Earth Wise

March 27, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

In a world where many go hungry in the context of rapidly changing environments, many experts contend that alternative food sources will be necessary to solve global food security problems. So-called novel food sources are central to this conversation, defined as foods with no history of consumption in a region – or perhaps anywhere.

Three popular examples are lab-grown meat, insect farming, and seaweed aquaculture. Each of these offer opportunities as well as challenges.

Lab-grown meat can refer to actual animal tissues raised in vats as well as the increasingly common cultured plant products made to resemble meat. Lab-grown meat faces push back from the livestock industry that contends it should not be labeled as any kind of meat. While results to date are positive, barriers still remain including concerns over product taste, healthiness, and cost. And while less land- and water-intensive than conventional livestock, cultured meat production is still energy intensive.

Insects do form a significant part of diets across the globe but have yet to be embraced in any substantial way in western cultures. Nutritionally, numerous species of insects are rich in key proteins, micronutrients, and minerals. But the “yuck factor” is a big barrier to cross.

Seaweed is a long-established part of many East Asian diets and has many potential dietary uses. Several selectively bred varieties of seaweed supply a range of valuable nutrients. Growing seaweed does not tax freshwater and terrestrial resources. But intensively cultivated seaweeds would have potential negative effects on local marine ecosystems.

There is no single solution to complex issues like food security. Novel foods may very well form part of the solution to a growing food crisis.

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Insects, seaweed and lab-grown meat could be the foods of the future

Photo, posted March 12, 2009, courtesy of Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Why Choose Chicken Over Beef?

July 22, 2019 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Food production is a major driver of climate change. It’s responsible for more than a quarter of all greenhouse gas emissions. But the environmental impact of different foods varies greatly, and making seemingly insignificant changes can actually have significant impacts.

According to a first-ever national study of U.S. eating habits and their carbon footprints, choosing chicken over beef will cut your dietary carbon footprint in half.

The National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey asked more than 16,000 participating Americans to name all the foods they consumed in the past 24 hours. The research team then calculated the carbon footprint of what people said they ate. If a respondent consumed broiled beef steak, for example, researchers calculated what the carbon footprint would have been had broiled chicken been consumed instead.

The study’s findings illustrate how making one simple substitution can significantly reduce a person’s dietary carbon footprint. A diet’s carbon footprint is the amount of greenhouse gas emissions that result from the energy, fertilizer, land use, and other inputs necessary to produce food.

In general, animal-based foods have a bigger carbon footprint than plant-based foods. For example, producing beef uses 20 times the land and emits 20 times the emissions as growing beans (per gram of protein), and requires 10 times more resources than producing chicken.

According to the World Resources Institute, keeping the increase in global warming below 2°C will be impossible without limiting the global rise in meat consumption.

Last year, the EAT-Lancet Commission report found that a radical transformation of the global food system was needed because it’s threatening the stability of the climate.

Make a change – big or small – today.

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Choosing chicken over beef cuts our carbon footprints a surprising amount

Photo, posted August 30, 2011, courtesy of Ken Hawkins via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.