First they came for your light bulbs, then your meat, now…bread!? Global Warming Linked To Production Of Bread, Study Reveals
The seemingly innocuous loaf of bread you just consumed may be contributing to global warming, according to a new published Wednesday in the science journal Nature Plants.
It has been known for some time that in addition to fossil fuels, food production and consumption significantly contributes to anthropogenic climate change. For instance, it has been estimated that switching to vegetarianism could possibly cut emissions by nearly 63 percent and adopting a vegan diet could reduce emissions by up to 70 percent. However, the new study by researchers from the University of Sheffield calculates the exact environmental impact of a loaf of bread and isolates the associated production process that releases the most greenhouse gases.
“We found in every loaf there is embodied global warming resulting from the fertilizer applied to farmers’ fields to increase their wheat harvest. This arises from the large amount of energy needed to make the fertilizer and from nitrous oxide gas released when it is degraded in the soil,” Liam Goucher, lead author of the study, said in a statement.
The study found the single biggest culprit was the ammonium nitrate fertilizer used in wheat cultivation, which accounts for nearly 43 percent of greenhouse gas emissions released in the production of a loaf of bread. Use of this fertilizer causes the release of nitrous oxide, which is a greenhouse gas that is reportedly 300 times worse than carbon dioxide. The study estimated that 60 percent of global agricultural crops are grown with the use of fertilizers which amounts to more than 100 million tons of fertilizers a year.
In order to reach their conclusions, the researchers analyzed the entire production cycle of bread, which includes growing and harvesting the wheat, milling the grain, producing the flour, baking the bread and finally, packaging the loaf. One loaf of bread weighing 1.8 pounds would have added 0.4 pounds of CO2 from baking, .06 pounds from milling and a whopping 0.56 pounds from the fertilizer used to harvest the wheat.
Although the report notes that cutting down on fertilizers may be helpful, it warns that doing so may cause less food production which can be detrimental in fighting world hunger and malnutrition.
“The findings raise a very important issue – whose responsibility is it to bring about the implementation of these interventions: …
Now Bread Causes ‘Global Warming’
By Paul Homewood
We have already been told we should not eat meat, as this contributes to global warming.
Now according to the EDP, we can’t eat bread either!
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NPR: What’s The Environmental Footprint Of A Loaf Of Bread? Now We Know
A new study published Monday in Nature Plants breaks down the environmental cost of producing a loaf of bread, from wheat field to bakery. It finds that the bulk of the associated greenhouse gas emissions come from just one of the many steps that go into making that loaf: farming.
The study was conducted by a team of researchers at the University of Sheffield, in the U.K. They wanted to understand the environmental impacts of the entire life cycle of a common staple. They chose bread and used a “real-world supply chain,” says Liam Goucher, the lead author of the study and a research fellow at the Grantham Center for Sustainable Futures at the University of Sheffield. “We focused on a specific farm, which was in Lincoln, in the U.K., and we focused on a specific mill and a specific [commercial] bakery.”
They collected and analyzed data for emissions involved at every step of the process, including growing the wheat, fertilizing it, harvesting the crop, transporting the grains to the mill, grinding the grains into flour, transporting the flour to a bakery and then baking and packaging a loaf of bread. Scientists call this a life cycle analysis.
Many stages were energy intensive and involved with emissions — for example, the machinery involved with tilling the soil, harvesting, and irrigation, or the electricity required to operate the mill and the bakery. But the vast majority of emissions — nearly 66 percent — came from growing wheat.
“We found that over half of the environmental impacts of producing a loaf of bread come from wheat cultivation,” says Goucher. “The interesting thing is that 40 percent is attributable just to the use of ammonium nitrate fertilizers alone, which is a huge amount, when you consider it.” The fertilizers also cause a lot of water pollution when they run off into streams and rivers.…
NBC News: How Eating Crickets Could Help Save the Planet By Fighting Global Warming
The world’s population is creeping up on 7.5 billion, but estimates suggest we’ll have a whopping 9 billion mouths to feed by 2050.
Unless we all stick to salads, the global production of meat will need to double in that time to feed our growing population, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of United Nations (FAO). Feed and crop production will also have to increase in kind to support livestock and our own appetites, inevitably taking up more land space and water — precious and dwindling commodities required for cattle.
But resources aren’t the only issue. This increase in agricultural production will exacerbate the effects of climate change by releasing more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere (agricultural activities currently contribute nearly one-tenth of the country’s greenhouse emissions). What’s more, animal waste releases ammonia, a pollutant that can affect soil and water quality.
Yet this seemingly large food security problem may have a bite-sized solution: insects.
In a 2013 report, the FAO suggested our current farming and food production practices are unsustainable — but that edible insects are a viable, untapped resource that could help meet the food and water demands of the world’s ever-expanding population. And it’s really no wonder: Insects are highly nutritious, and also far more environmentally friendly to raise than conventional livestock. Compared with cows, pigs, or chickens, crickets require a fraction of the land, water, and food, and produce less greenhouse gases and ammonia.
Knowing this, multiple farms dedicated to rearing crickets for human consumption have sprung up in recent years. Insects from these farms are served up whole at local farmer’s markets or sold to companies that turn them into fine powders, which can be added to recipes for an easy protein and nutrition boost. Numerous startups have taken those powders and put them into everything from nutrition bars to chips and cookies, pastas and sauces.
Flashback: Climate change could lead to ‘killer cornflakes’ – Warming temps could cause cereal to carry ‘potent liver toxin’
killer cornflakes
http://climatechangepredictions.org/uncategorized/7745
Climate change could lead to “killer cornflakes” with the cereal carrying the most potent liver toxin ever recorded, an environmental health conference has been told.
The effects of the toxins, known as mycotoxins, have been known since the Middle Ages, when rye bread contaminated with ergot fungus was a staple part of the European diet, environmental health researcher Lisa Bricknell from Central Queensland University, said.
Ms Bricknell said there had been outbreaks of high levels of aflatoxins in Australian crops in recent years and global warming was providing a new threat to food safety, with temperatures expected to rise in inland areas of the eastern states while rainfall was tipped to fall.
2016’s Alleged Record Warmth Brought Record Crop Yields, Fewer Storms
By Paul Homewood http://dailycaller.com/2017/01/19/2016s-record-warmth-brought-record-crop-yields-fewer-storms/ From the Daily Caller: Climate scientists declared 2016 the warmest year on record, sending shockwaves through the media, which immediately began attributing the warming to fossil fuel use.
Source: 2016’s Record Warmth Brought Record Crop Yields, Fewer Storms…
Wacky Claim: Forests ‘held their breath’ during global warming ‘pause’
From the UNIVERSITY OF EXETER comes this wacky headline:
Forests ‘held their breath’ during global warming hiatus, research shows
Global forest ecosystems, widely considered to act as the lungs of the planet, ‘held their breath’ during the most recent occurrence of a warming hiatus, new research has shown
Global forest ecosystems, widely considered to act as the lungs of the planet, ‘held their breath’ during the most recent occurrence of a warming hiatus, new research has shown.
The international study examined the full extent to which these vital ecosystems performed as a carbon sink from 1998-2012 – the most recent recorded period of global warming slowdown.
The researchers, including Professor Pierre Friedlingstein from the University of Exeter, demonstrated that the global carbon sink — where carbon dioxide is removed from the atmosphere and stored in the natural environment – was particularly robust during this 14 year period.
The study shows that, during extended period of slower warming, worldwide forests ‘breathe in’ carbon dioxide through photosynthesis, but reduced the rate at which they ‘breathe out’ — or release the gas back to the atmosphere.
The team believes the crucial study offers a significant breakthrough for future climate modelling, which is used to predict just how different ecosystems will respond to rising global temperatures.
The pioneering study is published in leading science journal, Nature Climate Change, on Monday, January 23 2017.
Crazy California Is Drawing Up Regulations Enact Anti-Cow Fart Law
If anything proves that the global warming/climate change nonsense has gone too far, this is it. During his first stint as governor of California in the late 1970s Jerry Brown was known by the nickname of “Governor Moonbeam.” Perhaps this go round he should be called “Governor Methane,” as his obsession with the climate change hypothesis is now leading California to regulate cow “emissions.”
In September Brown became the first governor ever to sign a bill that regulates supposed greenhouse gases from livestock operations and landfills. But no one asked the bovine methane moo-ers whether or not they agree. Cattle and other farm animals are major a major source of methane, a greenhouse gas many times more potent than carbon dioxide as a heat-trapping gas as well as being more potent as an aroma. The methane is released when they belch, fart, and release the raw material for cow chips.…
GLOBAL GREENING CAUSED PAUSE IN GROWTH RATE OF ATMOSPHERIC CO2, SCIENTISTS CLAIM
GLOBAL GREENING CAUSED PAUSE IN GROWTH RATE OF ATMOSPHERIC CO2, SCIENTISTS CLAIM
The rate of growth in atmospheric carbon dioxide has slowed, despite an increase in CO2 emissions from human activity, due to an increased uptake of the greenhouse gas by the planet’s plants, a new study has suggested.
Changes in the rates of photosynthesis and respiration in the Earth’s ecosystems have created a larger-than-expected terrestrial carbon sink, an international team of scientists has reported today in Nature Communications.
Co-author and CSIRO research scientist Dr Pep Canadell said increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels between 2002 and 2014 had led to enhanced photosynthesis in plants, the process by which plants take up carbon dioxide.
During the same period, a slowdown in the rise of global temperatures over land — known as the hiatus period — led to a slowdown in respiration, the process by which plants ‘breathe’ out carbon dioxide.
These two factors combined meant the world’s vegetation absorbed more carbon dioxide and slowed the growth rate in the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere by about 2.2 per cent a year between 2002 and 2014.
“The take-home message is that we have this incredible climate change discount — like half of the CO2 [humans emit] gets taken in by the natural carbon sinks,” Dr Canadell, executive director of the Global Carbon Project, said.
“So we want to do whatever we can to maintain the sink and enhance it if we can through programs such as reforestation and even before that avoiding deforestation in the first place.”
Oceans and land-based vegetation removed about 45 per cent of the CO2 emitted by humans each year, the researchers noted.
While absolute atmospheric CO2 levels had been increasing since the Industrial Revolution, there was significant year-to-year variability in the rate at which this increase occurred, largely driven by annual differences in plant growth.
Dr Canadell said satellite observations also showed the globe was “greening”, with areas previously too cold or dry now sustaining more plant life and areas with vegetation “greener than they were before”.
However, this increase in vegetation played a minor role in the increased uptake of carbon dioxide.
Slowdown may be temporary
Dr Canadell warned the slowdown in the growth rate of atmospheric CO2 could be temporary because the hiatus period, which was essential for decreased respiration, has now ended.
Full story
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Gov’t Research Says Plants Are Already Stopping Global Warming
New research published over the weekend by the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory found that plants are significantly slowing global warming far more than previously suspected.
Scientists found as carbon dioxide (CO2) levels increased worldwide, plants responded by sucking more CO2 out of the air than before. Researchers used satellite measurements of vegetation cover to determine that global rates of photosynthesis and respiration had sharply increased, largely due to the extra CO2.
“The scientists attribute the stalled CO2 growth rate to an uptick in land-based photosynthetic activity, fueled by rising CO2 levels from fossil fuel emissions,” states a summary of the research. “It’s a snowball effect: as CO2 levels rise in the atmosphere, photosynthetic activity flourishes and plants take in more carbon, sparking more plant growth, more photosynthesis, and more carbon uptake.”
Effectively, the DOE researchers found that plant growth caused by global warming ultimately reduced temperatures by significant margins.
“The growth in greenery is a consequence of climate change. As the planet heats up, places that were once too chilly for most plants to grow have become steadily more hospitable,” The Economist reported. “That extra vegetation, in turn, exerts its own effects on the climate.”…