Literature/202311111345 net zero agriculture
- Source: [[@gates2021How to avoid a climate disaster: the solutions we have and the breakthroughs we need]]
- Tags: #climate-change #climate-and-agriculture
Interesting insights: - The biggest contributor coming from agriculture is Methane. - Cows in Latin America emit 5X more methane than cows in the US or Europe (and in Africa even more). This is, in part, because cows in EU and US are of improved breeds that make milk and meat more efficiently. - Artificial meet has green premiums of 86% - Fertilizers are responsible for a portion of emissions. Nitrogen is needed for plant growth, but just a tiny fraction is absorbed by plants, the rest permeates into the ground, generating pollution, or it oxidizes and goes into the atmosphere as nitrous oxide (which is 256 times more powerful than $CO_2$). (This is the nitrogen problem) - Foresting is not as useful as preventing deforestation. Planting trees is good, but the focus should be in preventing the loss of tree coverage. Since 1990, the world has lost 60% of the tree cover. - The effect of planting trees on climate change appear to be moderate. A top of the envelope calculation says that you need to cover half the world in trees just to compensate the emissions of an average american household.
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