Addressing Berkeley's Food Emissions for Paris Agreement
- By Nilang Gor, Founder of Cultivate Empathy for All
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According to the World Economic Forum’s Global Shapers Survey, climate change is the top global issue [8]. Climate change impacts our healthcare, sustainability of natural resources, food security, poverty, social equality and economy. But in 2017, Trump withdrew from the Paris Agreement saying, "The Paris accord will undermine our economy" [1]. Soon after, more than 400 U.S. Mayors stood against this decision and declared to uphold the Paris Agreement as an effort to keep the average global surface temperature below 2 degrees Celcius [2]. Many of these Cities, including Berkeley, are aiming to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by developing local Climate Action Plans (CAP). These local CAPs could play an important role in meeting the Paris Agreement because about 80% of the U.S. population lives in urban areas and their consumption pattern can either protect or destroy the environment [3].
However, cities like Berkeley are not looking at emissions from the community’s consumption of goods, called Consumption-based GHG inventory [4]. Berkeley's current CAP mainly looks at Production-based GHG inventory [4]. This measure considers emissions from consumer goods only produced within the city limit [4]. Production-based GHG inventory ignores import-export trading and emissions from the entire product life cycle. For an example, 1 liter of beer generates 628 (100%) grams of Carbon Dioxide (CO2) from manufacturing (68%), transportation (6%) and retail (27%) [9]. But the Production-based GHG inventory won’t account for these emissions if the beer was produced outside Berkeley. If the beer was produced within the City limits, Production-based GHG inventory will only include emissions from manufacturing (68%). As a result, Production-based GHG inventory considerably underestimates community-wide emissions [4]. This is the reason Berkeley’s food consumption emissions are not recognized in the CAP, even though the agriculture sector is globally one of the major GHG contributors [10].
Figure 1: Berkeley's Consumption-based GHG inventory [5].
The obvious question one might ask: Is it really important to address the emissions from animal products like meat and dairy to meet the Paris Agreement? According to the World Resource Institute (WRI), the global emissions need to be limited to 21 Gigatons (Gt) of CO2E/year in order to keep the average global surface temperature below 2 degrees Celcius [7]. If agriculture emissions go unaddressed, this sector alone is expected to generate 70% (15Gt Co2e/year) of the allowable GHG emissions by 2050, jeopardizing the Paris Agreement [7].
Figure 2: Diet comparison in reducing agriculture GHG emissions and land use [7].
Nilang Gor, is a Molecular Biologist and the founder of Cultivate Empathy for All. Nilang is global citizen and active member of the community with his constant participation through activism/volunteering for homelessness, animal rights and environment. Nilang believes our ecosystem is built on the principle on interdependence and exponential growth in globalization is making our well-being more interdependent than ever before. As a result, he believes cultivating empathy for all is the key factor in creating systemic harmony on our planet earth.