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Milk alternatives produce up to 4.5x less greenhouse gas emissions as milk

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Re: Milk alternatives produce up to 4.5x less greenhouse gas emissions as milk

#171

I heard that the trendy thing to do now in coffee shops is to ask for your drink to be made with regular cow milk.

As a lactose intolerant person personally I love the fact that there is now a wide proliferation of non-diary creamers that aren't gross french vanilla coffee mate stuff. I used to drink my coffee black because that stuff always made me feel sick. Now I can enjoy it with some almond or oat milk.

Lactose free milk, cream and many other dairy products are widely available.

I’m not lactose intolerant but I do buy lactofree milk I find it to last a bit longer and I see no reason to temp fate as you can become more and more intolerant as you grow older and I do like my cheeses.

Re: Milk alternatives produce up to 4.5x less greenhouse gas emissions as milk

#172
post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're ignoring that cows are also carbon stores (and relatively dense ones as far as biodiversity goes). Look, the problem is real simple. Simple math says that we can do this: Carbon(in atomosphere) + Carbon(biomass) + Carbon(underground) = Carbon(total on earth) Biomass gets it's carbon from atomosphere, and releases (most) of it back to atmosphere, and hence not a real problem as it undergoes a stable cycle and i…

So by your logic we could just turn all forests to farmland and use it to raise cows without any noticeable impact on climate (or I guess environment in general)? And before you say you wouldn't turn ALL the forests to farmland, I'd like to point out that we've already done so to a massive amount of the planet. Forest coverage went from 60% of land area to just 30% in the last 70 years.

>So by your logic we could just turn all forests to farmland and use it to raise cows without any noticeable impact on climate (or I guess environment in general)?

That depends. If I take a forest which stores X amount of carbon, and replace it with farmland which has .1X the carbon. The remaining .9x carbon would have gone in the atmosphere. But now I can take that .1x carbon, put it into some cows, and grow another .1x on the farm, and now we're at .2x carbon (.1x in some cows + .1x in the plants on the farmland). I can do this and grow the population of cows, and eventually have a denser store of carbon than the forest alone originally had, but also eventually hit a sustainable limit.

But what I'm really saying is: focusing on stuff like this is not what we should be doing, as it's negligible and doesn't address the root of the problem. We need to look at the bigger picture. Which is: where is the problematic carbon ultimately coming from? Changing forests into farmland? Okay that can be easily changed in 100 or so years (and nature naturally does it for us). Burning a tank of gas in a few minutes? It takes millions of years for nature to reverse that... (not to mention that oil is an even denser store of carbon than trees).

Re: Milk alternatives produce up to 4.5x less greenhouse gas emissions as milk

#173
i am gonna guess that oat milk costs a lot more than milk... yep, $5.19 for a quart at walmart....as for milk? $3.50 for a gallon...

same thing for artificial meat or even soy protein--easily more expensive than regular pork/hamburger/chicken...

no surprise, seeing as how most of eco-leftism is really just propaganda aimed to increasing profits...and this propaganda is always aimed to young people who are willing to spend more money to send a signal to others about their conscientiousness...and also easily manipulated by propaganda

Re: Milk alternatives produce up to 4.5x less greenhouse gas emissions as milk

#174

i am gonna guess that oat milk costs a lot more than milk... yep, $5.19 for a quart at walmart....as for milk? $3.50 for a gallon... same thing for artificial meat or even soy protein--easily more expensive than regular pork/hamburger/chicken... no surprise, seeing as how most of eco-leftism is really just propaganda aimed to increasing profits...and this propaganda is always aimed to young people who are willing to…

> no surprise, seeing as how most of eco-leftism is really just propaganda aimed to increasing profits.

Maybe, or maybe the incumbent products are massively subsidized.

Re: Milk alternatives produce up to 4.5x less greenhouse gas emissions as milk

#176
post #86

I heard that the trendy thing to do now in coffee shops is to ask for your drink to be made with regular cow milk.

"Milk" still means "cows milk" at every coffee shop I've been to, and I would be embarrassed to say "cows milk", as if I'm importing some internet culture war into the real world. Literally everyone will know what you mean if you say "with milk", unless you are at some specifically vegan coffee shop.

Yes; "milk" with no qualifier is what comes out of the dangly bits of cows. If you order "eggs" at a restaurant, expect something that's been inside a chicken.

Re: Milk alternatives produce up to 4.5x less greenhouse gas emissions as milk

#177
post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only dairy alternative that has comparable protein quality (DIAAS) is soy, and AFAIK there aren't many studies of soy milk given to toddlers/small kids.

Ok, but even if you rule out soymilk, it's not like there's no other source of protein suitable for a toddler.

Consumption of a mostly soy diet by small children is undesirable because of the presence of phytoestrogens in soy.

Pulses would come close second as a protein source, but a child would have to consistently eat larger servings in order to keep up with other meat-eating-and-milk-drinking children. Large portions are not always realistic in ensuring adequate protein intake in kids, who will occasionally go through phases of fussy eating.

Adopting vegetarian or vegan habits is great when periods of significant growth stop (and maybe this is what humans are meant to do, rather than to keep eating animal products in adulthood).

However, from my own experience, meat and milk is a necessity for avoiding malnourishment in little humans undergoing development.

Re: Milk alternatives produce up to 4.5x less greenhouse gas emissions as milk

#178
post #58

Milk alternatives don't have any benefits in children. Milk drinking in children is thought to induce growth. You can't overdo it though as it interferes with iron absorption. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-63647-8 see the references height difference found: https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/106/2/597/4557638 may be related to IGF-1: https://www.nature.com/articles/1601948

Milk should be the beverage of choice for growing kids who do not have contraindications. 3.25% milk is recommended up until 2 years of age, and to continue into older age if there are no issues with obesity. (1) https://www.albertahealthservices.ca/assets/info/nutrition/i...

I drink a ton of milk, maybe a third of a gallon a day. Always thought the obsession with counting calories was a little misplaced. It always seems to be very fit people drinking a ton of milk. People think that junk like Special K is healthy and great stuff like butter, eggs, and milk is bad for you. Tell that to French people who live to 120.

Re: Milk alternatives produce up to 4.5x less greenhouse gas emissions as milk

#179
post #86

I heard that the trendy thing to do now in coffee shops is to ask for your drink to be made with regular cow milk.

"Milk" still means "cows milk" at every coffee shop I've been to, and I would be embarrassed to say "cows milk", as if I'm importing some internet culture war into the real world. Literally everyone will know what you mean if you say "with milk", unless you are at some specifically vegan coffee shop.

In NYC, and this is no longer true or assumed. I think oat milk is the most commonly used now. I have to say cow's milk pretty frequently just to get cow's milk, though I could probably get away with saying "regular milk."

Re: Milk alternatives produce up to 4.5x less greenhouse gas emissions as milk

#180
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Milk" still means "cows milk" at every coffee shop I've been to, and I would be embarrassed to say "cows milk", as if I'm importing some internet culture war into the real world. Literally everyone will know what you mean if you say "with milk", unless you are at some specifically vegan coffee shop.

In NYC, and this is no longer true or assumed. I think oat milk is the most commonly used now. I have to say cow's milk pretty frequently just to get cow's milk, though I could probably get away with saying "regular milk."

I live in the UWS and this is not my experience
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