What to eat to save the planet
How much carbon can you save by switching cheesecake for cashew-cheesecake?
Haere mai, welcome to Future Proof, brought to you by Electric Kiwi.
I’m a big fan of potatoes. Mashed, roasted, boiled, fried… whatever way you cook them, potatoes are the perfect food. So I was delighted to see the humble potato come out on top in an analysis of environmental impact and nutritional quality across 57,000 different foodstuffs. All hail the potato! Queen of sustainable deliciousness!
Better food for you and the planet too
Researchers assessed food products available at Tesco, the UK’s largest food retailer, for their greenhouse gas emissions, land use, water stress and fertiliser use, and paired this with a measure of nutrition. Good news: more nutritious foods tend to also be more environmentally friendly. Bad news: chocolate didn’t score very well.
Coming soon: A ‘planetary health diet’ for Kiwis
Food is an important part of the sustainability puzzle. We all need to eat, and what we eat can mean more or less carbon emissions. Dr Cristina Cleghorn from the University of Otago is part of a team crafting a sustainable, healthy diet for New Zealanders that’s backed by evidence – a New Zealand-specific version of the Planetary Health Diet. The diet they’ve developed generates just half the greenhouse gas emissions of an average Kiwi diet, meets all of our nutritional guidelines, and costs the same as the current “baseline” diet. Cleghorn can’t give specifics as it hasn’t yet been published, but says it’s “not very similar to the traditional New Zealand diet.” We’re looking at more plants, less animal products.
Local vs. plant-based
The team has also calculated the emissions associated with more than 300 different NZ food items. Like me, you may be wondering: is it better to choose locally produced meat or dairy, or a plant-based alternative made from ingredients grown on the other side of the world? It turns out, food type is more important than food source when it comes to carbon emissions: only 5-10% comes from transportation. “The highest emission, animal-based foods have more than eight times more greenhouse gas emissions than the highest emission, plant-based foods,” says Cleghorn.
The Auckland catering company elevating sustainable food practices
One New Zealand business has used this data to demonstrate how your food choices affect your carbon footprint. The Sustainable Food Co. already has some impressive eco-cred, with a zero-waste ethos that’s diverted nearly 30,000 single-use plastic items from landfill since launching in 2020. Now, each of their plant-based menu items shows the kg of carbon saved compared to the meat-and-dairy-containing equivalent.
For example, a plant-based cheesecake (made with cashews) saves 15.62kg of carbon compared to its dairy equivalent. “Every meal, we have a choice to make a difference and it can be so good for you and so good for the planet – it's just a double whammy,” says founder Amy Klitscher. “I really want to marry those two benefits with showing people that [plant-based food] can also taste amazing.” (The best compliment she’s received: “Better than McDonald’s”.)
The cow-sized elephant in the room
So will we all need to follow Klitscher’s lead and give up animal products? Cleghorn says we will need to make some “drastic” changes to limit climate change, but it’s not helpful to tell individuals to completely cut meat and dairy. Instead, we need to rethink consumption – eating smaller portions less frequently. While Cleghorn’s planetary health diet doesn’t take into account what we like to eat, food is not just about health and carbon emissions. It’s also about culture, connection and enjoyment. Still, I reckon we can find a delicious way to eat that’s better for both us and the planet. That might mean less meat, but we’ll still have potatoes.
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Ongoing marine heatwave breaks records
A lingering marine heatwave may have intensified winter storms, explains NZ Herald’s science reporter Jamie Morton. More than 250 sensors have been deployed on commercial fishing gear to monitor ocean temperatures in real time. Regions like the Bay of Plenty and Taranaki are experiencing water temperatures 1.5°C higher than normal. It’s a heatwave that’s been ongoing since last summer when extraordinarily warm temperatures in Fiordland led to sponge bleaching that shocked scientists.
But as Kate Evans writes in New Zealand Geographic, when researchers returned in June, the sponges had survived. Sponges aren’t the only marine fauna impacted by warming oceans: recent research suggests that blue and sperm whales may move south to cooler waters which could have implications for Kaikōura’s famous whale-watching industry, writes Amber Allott of the Dominion Post.
Helping our Pacific whānau with climate action
Over the weekend, Foreign Affairs Minister Nanaia Mahuta announced a $1.3 billion package to help climate change adaptation and mitigation projects across the Pacific. The International Climate Finance Strategy includes $8 million for Tonga’s Climate Change Fund and $500k for renewable energy projects. The strategy itself is not a detailed list of such initiatives, but rather outlines at a high level the types of investments New Zealand will seek out over the next three years with this tranche of funding. Meanwhile, The Detail podcast investigates the difficulties of relocating entire Pacific island communities as sea levels rise, focusing on the Carteret Islands in Papua New Guinea.
Is it time for New Zealand to embrace micro-EVs?
Is this the future of private vehicles? Tiny (and unfortunately, ugly) micro-cars are taking over streets overseas, but these super-cheap electric vehicles are not currently legal in New Zealand, writes Jeremy Rose for The Spinoff. Auckland’s Transport Emissions Reduction Pathway, which I discussed in last week’s newsletter, mentions “micromobility” a few times. I asked transport strategy manager Robert Simpson what this refers to: “There's all sorts of technological innovations going on elsewhere in the world – variations on scooters, e-bikes, cargo bikes, micro-cars.” So perhaps one day soon they could have a place on our decarbonised roads (but maybe someone can design one that actually looks cute, pretty please?).
Speaking of EVs, a reader asked about the trade-offs between buying a new EV (which requires carbon to manufacture) or sticking with your existing petrol-powered wheels. Well, it’s complicated. That will vary greatly depending on the age and type of your existing car, as well as how much driving you plan to do. It takes more carbon to manufacture an EV compared to your classic internal combustion engine, but once you take driving into account, the lifecycle emissions of an EV are 60% less than a petrol/diesel car, according to Gen Less.
Batty find in Christchurch waterway
Could pekapeka-tou-roa long-tailed bats, aka Bird of the Year 2021, be living in north Christchurch? They haven’t been seen in the area since 1885, when they used to roost under a bridge across the Avon river. But now evidence of the endangered species has been found in the form of pekapeka DNA detected in the Styx River, writes Stuff’s Will Harvie.
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More stories:
If we all got on our bikes like people in Denmark, we’d avoid “a UK’s worth” of emissions.
The Spinoff’s Chris Schulz talks to the founder of a sustainable sneaker company whose shoes are designed to fully disintegrate in the compost once you’ve worn them out.
Why didn’t freshwater quality reform live up to scientists’ expectations? Stuff’s Charlie Mitchell takes a deep dive into the fraught science-policy nexus and the process that led to watered-down rules.
Across the ditch, Sydney is considering a ban on fossil fuel advertising – in a similar vein to anti-tobacco advertising laws.
A truck driver walking his dog discovered Canterbury’s first known set of moa footprints.
To end this edition, you’ve probably already seen this viral story, but it’s too good not to share: a fur seal pup broke into a house in Mount Maunganui via a cat flap, and caused a spot of havoc. It reminded me of this snap of a New Zealand sea lion that snuck into the ladies’ loo in the pub on Rakiura Stewart Island back in 2007. Talk about nosy neighbours! Here’s to learning to live alongside our wonderful wildlife as it returns to our coastlines.
Seal you later,
Ellen
Got some feedback about Future Proof or topics you’d like covered? Get in touch with me at futureproof@thespinoff.co.nz
aue. in the cited research no reference is made to agricultural methods and their impact on the environment. e.g. commercially grown potatoes are sprayed with herbicide in the field to make them easier to harvest. just before they appear on supermarket shelves they are hit with glyphosate. why are researchers and promoters of "helathy" food not talking about organic and regenerative food production. dont eat non-organic potatoes.....