How Much Water Is Used to Produce 1 Pound of Beef
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You lot have already wasted hundreds of gallons of water today, and yous probably don't fifty-fifty realize it. Where is all this invisible water going, you lot ask? The answer is unproblematic: our nutrient. You volition never meet the majority of water you swallow in your lifetime, and this is considering food comprises ⅔ of the average American's water footprint. Nothing that lands on your dinner plate gets there without the use of water: crops can't flourish without water; the grain we feed our livestock needs h2o to abound; and fifty-fifty the most processed, artificial foods utilize water during the manufacturing process. In fact, the agronomics manufacture is responsible for approximately 80% of the water used in the U.S. So—how to cut downward on your water footprint without starving yourself? It'southward important to realize that when information technology comes to h2o, not all foods are created equal. In general, meat has a much larger h2o footprint than fruits, vegetables and grains. This is because of the massive amounts of virtual water that get into creating nutrient for livestock. Beef—which is the second most popular meat in the U.S.—has the largest water footprint out of all types of meat, taking a whopping 1,800 gallons of h2o per pound. Apparently, cutting meat out of your diet birthday would be a great way to curb your personal water footprint. But if the thought of living a burger-free existence is as well much to bear, not to worry—there are other means to reduce your water footprint without giving up steak forever.
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For some tips on where to showtime, VICE Impact talked with Peter Hanlon, Deputy Director of Programs at GRACE Communications Foundation—a leading, national non-profit devoted to promoting sustainability in food, h2o and energy systems—to get some answers. What goes into our water footprint, and how does nutrient fit into that? When we talk nearly the water footprint, it'due south actually about "virtual h2o" use versus "direct water" use. About people are used to thinking most their direct water use—so, water that comes out of the tap, out of the shower, flushing the toilet, etc. But virtual water is the h2o that goes into producing the food we eat, the energy we use, and all the products we buy. People never run into their virtual water use, so it's a harder concept to grasp. Simply information technology'due south really a key concept, considering the largest function of our water footprint is the water that'south used to abound the food that nosotros consume. Why does meat have a greater h2o footprint than fruits, vegetables or grains? There's something called a "feed conversion ratio," which tells us how rapidly livestock can turn whatever grain or feed that they're eating into mass. Some animals are pretty efficient, but cows are not then good at that. It takes a lot of grains or grasses to produce and grow these larger animals for meat. And all those grains and grasses take water to grow in turn. So the water footprint of meat is greater, considering you're using products from lower on the food chain to abound something larger. Are there differences between the h2o footprints of meat raised on a factory farm versus meat raised on a free-range subcontract? When nosotros're talking well-nigh raising livestock, a key concept to empathize is that the h2o footprint is actually made of iii parts: there'south the light-green water footprint, the bluish water footprint and the greyness water footprint. The green water footprint, when it comes down to it, is substantially rainfall. The blue h2o footprint is the amount of h2o that's extracted from reservoirs, surface water and groundwater to irrigate fields. And so the gray water footprint is an indicator of the amount of pollution you're causing. For example, if y'all look at beefiness that is pasture raised, we're talking nearly a light-green water footprint because the animals are eating grass that's beingness fed by rainwater. Only if yous look at a more industrial organization, we're talking almost a larger blue h2o footprint; those cattle start on grass every bit well, merely eventually they are switched over to feedlots where they're fed grains which are much more intensive in their needs for irrigation. Then there'south also the pollution aspect, or grey water footprint. On a pasture-raised organization, the waste material that the cattle are producing is actually used as fertilizer, so information technology'southward a do good. But if you're talking almost an industrial organization, you take 100,000 head of cattle all pooping in one place. And all that waste is typically moved into a manure lagoon, which is a massive pond of waste that ofttimes tin can leak. Waste matter can leak into the groundwater, it tin can leak into nearby bodies of water, so instead of that waste matter existence a benefit, it can actually be a pollutant. On a personal level—if yous don't want to go full vegetarian, how can you reduce your water footprint and withal swallow meat? Offset, eat less meat and ameliorate meat. In terms of "less meat," yous can get "flexitarian," yous tin can practise "Meatless Mondays," or yous can fifty-fifty just shrink the portion of meat that yous're serving. Those are all positive things and you don't necessarily have to "go vegetarian." And then in terms of "better meat," if y'all choose pasture raised meat certified past a quality third party group—something like Animal Welfare Canonical or Certified Humane—you can trust that meat volition have less impact on h2o resources than conventionally raised meat. The second method to reduce your water footprint, would exist eating fewer processed foods. And so finally, the 3rd method of reducing your water footprint is to waste less food. Most 40 percent of the food that'due south raised in the US is ultimately never eaten, and that accounts for nearly a quarter of the fresh water we swallow in this country. All that waste is just an abhorrent corruption of resources that we have. Fifty-fifty the simplest thing in the world, like planning your meals before you get to the market, can save those resources. This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Whole foods use less h2o than candy foods. Once you lot get-go processing foods, that takes boosted h2o for many different services—anything from creating oils that are used to cook foods to powering the plants that are processing these foods. That all raises the h2o footprint.
Source: https://www.vice.com/en/article/d3z8az/1800-gallons-of-water-goes-into-one-pound-of-meat
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