Confused About Energy :: Diet and Greenhouse Gases

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28^th June 2022

The costs calculated based on these fuel prices should be regarded as 'good estimates', given that fuel prices vary in different parts of the county and at different time of the year.

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Site prices were last updated 28^th June 2022. When they are updated all calculations on the site are updated with the new prices automatically Read More.

Electricity	£0.271 per unit (1 kWh)
Economy Electricity	£0.094 per unit (1 kWh)
Gas	£0.072 per unit (1 kWh)
Domestic LPG	£0.122 per unit (1 kWh)
Heating Oil	£0.104 per unit (1 kWh)
UK Grid CO₂ Emissions	0.233 kg per kWh used

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Unit	Name	Detail
W	Watt	Unit of Power
kW	Kilowatt	1000 watts
kWh	Kilowatt hour	Measure of Energy
L	Litre	Measure of Volume

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Diet and Greenhouse Gases 5867

Environmental Issues

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Just how big is the impact of a diet on Greenhouse gas emissions. It may surprise you how big it is if you are a big beef eater. (not the type at the tower of London)

The data for food consumption and greenhouse gas emissions comes from a USA Website, it is well written and backed up, so we will not try to reproduce it, I suggest you visit, it's a good article.

Given that it is data for the USA it is a warped perspective for that nation and arguably the USA is one of the most wasteful countries on Earth so the emissions relating to food are as high as they get. The main data is in the table below

CO₂e emissions for various diets, by calculating the effect of food production and supply chain logistics. CO₂e is explained here
Diet	Emissions kg CO₂e / per person year	Emissions kg CO₂e / per person day
Meat Lover	3300	9.0
Average Diet	2500	6.8
No Beef	1900	5.2
Vegetarian	1700	4.7
Vegan	1500	4.1

It is an interesting perspective. The data includes the whole food supply chain in the calculations as well as animal husbandry, crop harvesting and transport. One glaringly obvious fact from the data.... don't eat cows.

According to this article food production accounts for a very large proportion of greenhouse gas emissions up to 25% - that seems high, but even if it is half that value and the world were to stop eating beef global warming would be mitigated.