Monday 23 June 2008

Fuel in relation to plant and vegetable protein

I thought I would share this interesting article from the Guardian. It gives many good economic and environmental arguements for considering a vegetarian lifestyle. Here is an extract:

"A University of Chicago study argued that the average meat eater in the US produces about 1.5 tonnes of CO[squared] more than a vegetarian per year. That's because animals are hungry and the grain they eat takes energy, usually fossil fuels, to produce. It takes 2.2 calories of fossil fuel energy to produce a single calorie of plant protein, according to researchers at Cornell University. And lots of that plant protein is required to make animal protein. For chicken, the ratio of energy in to protein out is 4:1. For pork it's 17:1. For lamb, 50:1. For beef, 54:1."

For the full article see:
http://lifeandhealth.guardian.co.uk/food/story/0,,2286172,00.html#article_continue