I ride a scooter to work. I replace burned-out light bulbs with CFLs. I shop for local produce at the farmers' market. In short, I try to do everything a responsible urban dweller should do to reduce her greenhouse gas emissions. Except that I eat meat. And according to a recent article in Audubon Magazine, eating meat could be as damaging to the climate as racing all over town in a Hummer throwing empty plastic water bottles out the window. Mike Tidwell, director of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, says worldwide livestock production is responsible for 18 percent of total greenhouse gases, more than the emissions of all the cars, buses, trains and airplanes in the world combined. Even local, organic meat is not exempt. Whether or not it burns huge amounts of fossil fuels in transport, meat production of any kind cannot avoid the actual emissions of the animals (methane and nitrous oxide in the case of sheep and cows), which are powerful greenhouse gases. In fact, organic, free-range chickens actually have a 20 percent greater impact on global warming than conventionally raised birds because they eat more feed and take longer to raise, an ironic twist which has left me staring sadly at the expensive sustainably-raised meat in the supermarket. Tidwell's solution has been to give up meat entirely and cut down his consumption of eggs and dairy, joining the 3 percent of Americans who are true vegetarians. (For the record, untrue vegetarians are those that eat chicken or indulge in bacon. Sorry, doesn't count.) Not an easy lifestyle change to be sure, but not an impossibility, especially in vegetarian-friendly California. A more realistic solution for most people is to simply cut back on meat consumption, from the per capita American average of 12 ounces per day to 3.1 ounces, a change which experts have calculated would protect the climate. Should you find it difficult to turn down that half-pound burger on the menu, there is also the matter of global warming and the immediate suffering of the world's poorest people. Changes in weather, floods and drought, have devastating effects for subsistence farmers, those who already live on so little -- and eat so little meat. So while we're happily chowing down on our 84 ounces of greenhouse-gas-spewing meat a week, families in Bangladesh stare out at their barren fields and wonder why the rains haven't come and if they'll have enough food to make through the year. Still want that burger? ...Yeah, me neither. Photo by jamesjordan, licensed under Creative Commons.