exc-55883f6de4b00e437e021e97
Edited 6/24 for some added clarity and neutrality.
Update: the Considerates were able to find flaws in the study below; we’ve posted a correction here.
The vast majority of Americans (over 80%) believe that global warming is a real phenomenon, and over 60% approve of measures being taken at the federal level to curb it (from a set of polls here).
Many Americans also feel that they and others should change their personal decisions in order to help curb global warming. Sometimes this feeling takes on some strong emotions, like in the case of the SUV.
What is your emotional reaction when you see someone driving an SUV or a big truck? How would you feel if you knew they rarely had cargo or passengers when they drove — that is, if they didn’t make much use of their vehicle’s extra capacity?
We can probably agree that SUV ownership causes negative emotional reactions in some people.
But something to consider: have you ever seen a dog owner and felt similarly to how you feel about SUV owners?
A study by professors at Victoria University (published in their book, Time to Eat the Dog?) found that dogs generate more carbon emissions than SUVs, due largely to the meat-heavy foods they consume. A cat accounts for about the same amount of carbon emissions as a small Volkswagen.
The benefits of dogs and cats are very different from those of SUVs–and hard to compare. But when thinking about our choices and those of others, should dogs or trucks capture our attention and emotion?
When we’re considering which personal decisions should get the spotlight in the conversation about reducing carbon emissions, how well have we measured the relative impacts of different choices?
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There's a lot to unpack here.
Saying someone's dog is killing the environment is a much touchier topic. Its more similar to saying "your kid is killing the environment" than "your car is killing the environment". People tend to have intense emotional connections with their pets versus their cars.
The other part of this, is that for a SUV vs a pet, there's easy alternatives to the SUV. A smaller car, a more efficient model, electric cars... they're easy to point to and they're easily incorporated into a purchasing decision. But what's the easy substitute to a dog? A cat? There's nothing that does the job "just as well".
Let's not even get into the carbon emissions of eating meat.
SUVs get lambasted because there is an "easy" fix to them.
http://phys.org/news/2009-11-dogs-larger-carbon-footprint-suv.html
The study isn't completely credible :
Clark Williams-Derry, chief researcher at the Sightline Institute, a nonprofit sustainability think-tank in Seattle, scoffed at the study, which is how scientists express disdain.
"When I saw the study I ran some quick numbers," Williams-Derry said. "The average dog has to eat at least twice as much as the average person for this to be right. People are just heavier than dogs so, I just had to scratch my head at that.
"It doesn't mean dogs don't have a big impact," he noted. "But I view it with a healthy dose of skepticism."
Let's also look at the basic fact that most dog food meat is a byproduct of human meat (the stuff we won't eat) and would be produced anyway and then thrown out. Likewise much of the transportation and distribution is shared with human food
This looks much more like a distraction than an actual story,
I love the attention to detail/honesty--thanks, as always. I'll run a few numbers myself and see what happens :)
I think the moral to draw from this is that we must try to live frugally, wisely and selflessly in as many ways as possible. When I lived in the countryside, a cat or a dog was a reasonable pet since there was space to roam and our farm always had surplus feed; now that I live in a small apartment, I feel that I ought to forgo a pet. A large vehicle is sometimes necessary for a remote area; but in the city I walk or use public transportation.
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