Renewable Gossip

At last week’s 2009 Poptech conference, author Michael Pollan made this claim: “A vegan in a Hummer has a lighter carbon footprint than a beef eater in a Prius.”

Michael Pollan

Days later, Pollan, author of the bestseller Omnivore’s Dilemma, retracted the statement after researchers showed that Hummers are significantly more destructive to the environment than hamburgers.

In a blog posted by Reuters’ Adam Pacisk, this evidence came to light:

• Gidon Eshel and Pamela Martin of the University of Chicago found, in a 2006 study, that the difference between a heavy meat-eating diet and a vegan diet was about 2 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent per person per year.
• The professors found the difference between a Prius and a Hummer-sized SUV is 4.76 tons per year.

Therefore, switching to a Prius from a Hummer saves more than twice as much greenhouse gas emissions as giving up meat. Of course, going vegan and hybrid at the same time would be like super-sizing your carbon offsets.

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