It’s apparent that our current administration has prioritized the environment and the threat of global warming over the need allow the U.S. to be oil and gas self-sufficient. This is clear from their policies, practices and comments, even this week.

Long before this current dramatic energy price surge, which may just be beginning, I began researching to understand the realities of global warming, energy production, and the effect on the environment.

I’ve watched many documentaries that portray the threat of global warming as the most important problem to be addressed by this current generation. Most of those have such a bias built in to their premise that I don’t think they’re being objective or accurate. The same goes for the many podcasts dedicated to this topic. It’s also been my observation that the legacy news networks' coverage of environmental and energy stories mostly side with the administration on this issue.

Last month I heard an interview on a podcast with Patrick Moore. He was a co-founder of Greenpeace. According to one of his books, “Patrick has been one of the world’s strongest voices for better stewardship of the environment, but he refuses to politicize his commitment to a sustainable planet by abusing authentic science or manipulating facts.”

After hearing the interview on the podcast, I ordered two of Patrick Moore’s books, Confessions of a Greenpeace Dropout: The Making of a Sensible Environmentalist and Fake Invisible Catastrophes and Threats of Doom. I’m halfway through the latter and aim to read both books before my next blog post in two weeks. So look for highlights and impressions from these two books.

Last week I attended the annual Colorado Governor’s Forum on Agriculture. One of the breakout sessions had "Oil, Gas, Energy and the Environment" as its theme, so I attended it with great interest.

The speaker works for the oil and natural gas industry in Colorado, so his point of view favored the need for more U.S. production. His presentation was quite convincing, demonstrating the U.S. has all the oil and natural gas it will need to remain energy independent for many hundreds of years. And the technologies to drill, collect and store it have improved greatly over the last 30 years. For example, the fluid they initially used for fracking was not great for the environment, but the 97% water-based fluids they use now are environmentally friendly and safe for water aquifers. He claimed that the concerns over the environmental damage caused by fossil fuel production and consumption have been politicized and are not objective.

I do want to get my arms around this issue and I think we all should. Our industry is often plagued with the belief that meat production, especially beef, is harming the environment and should be eliminated, except for perhaps grass-finished beef.

It’s also apparent that more companies in our industry are coming out with public announcements that they are "sustainable" or have a "sustainability program." I’ve read many of these program claims and have attended a few seminars given by people in our industry. I’ll comment more on some of these observations in later blogs.

How about you and your journey to fully understand the environmental impacts of meat production and consumption? I’m sure you have an opinion about this topic, but is it objective? What material in the form of books, movies, articles and podcasts have you interacted with that have formed your opinions?

I’m trying to be objective about this topic, but we all have a point of view colored by our industry, our upbringing, where we make our money, our political affiliations and our overall worldview.

I do have a serious concern for the environment. I believe we are stewards of it for future generations. I don’t want to see our environment get trashed because we’re careless, short-sighted or greedy. But, from what I’ve learned so far, this is a tough topic to fully understand objectively. That’s why I’m reading and listening to both sides.

Currently, I have more questions than answers, but I’d like to include you on my journey through this big-scale topic, so stay tuned.

Global warming: Reality or hype?

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