Products

Product CO2e / kg Studies

Milk

1.8
CO2e / kg
= 100 g of Milk
You can consume
1.5
kg of Milk to exhaust your daily CO2e food budget

Categories: Dairy | Food

About half the emissions from dairy production is from methane produced in the cattle's stomach1. Manure accounts for about a quarter of the emissions, while feed contributes about 15-20%. Energy consumption and postfarm emissions represent less than 10% of the emissions in total.

  1. Opio, C., Gerber, P., Mottet, A., Falcucci, A., Tempio, G., MacLeod, M., ... & Steinfeld, H. (2013). Greenhouse gas emissions from ruminant supply chains–A global life cycle assessment. Food and agriculture organization of the United Nations. https://www.fao.org/3/i3461e/i3461e.pdf (Figure 5) ↩

Subcategories: Mini milk | Skim milk | Milk (eco) | Milk (low-fat) | Milk (UHT) | Goat milk | Buttermilk | Milk (ESL) | Sheep milk

Studies

Source Notes CO2e Country origin Country consumption Weight
Systematic review of greenhouse gas emissions for different fresh food categories Table 4 Median; #LCA studies: 77; #GWP values: 262; Mean: 1.39; Stdev: 0.58; Min: 0.54; Max: 7.5
1.29
 Unknown Unknown 8
Reducing food’s environmental impacts through producers and consumers Figure 1
3.2
 Unknown Unknown 8
Potential contributions of food consumption patterns to climate change domestic, 4% fat; CO2: 0.45, NO2: 0.14, NH4: 0.45
1.0
 Sweden Sweden 8
FiBL CO2-Fußabdruck von Bioprodukten Murauer, 3,5% fat, Konventionell; Production: 1.157; Transport: 0.06; Packaging: 0.059; https://www.fibl.org/fileadmin/documents/de/oesterreich/arbeitsschwerpunkte/Klima/ergebnisse_milch_090625.pdf
1.186
 Austria Austria 3
Meat eater's guide to climate change + health Table 14. Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Milk Production (at farmgate)
Milk Production System kg of CO2e per kg of edible whole milk kg of CO2e per kg of edible 2% milk
Wisconsin (high productivity)
1.02 0.67
Idaho 1.10
Table 15. Greenhouse Gas Emission from Milk (2%) Consumption (post-farmgate)
Emission Source kg of CO2e per kg of consumed 2% milk
Processing 0.48
Domestic transport 0.30
Refrigeration (retail) 0.06
Home cooking 0.00
Waste disposal 0.14
Total 0.98
Per kg of consumed meat (includes waste loss and post-farmgate):
Not listed, but calculated as 1.06*1.44+0.98=2.5 kg CO2e
2.5
 USA USA 6
Pendos CO2-Zähler Milch
0.95
 Unknown Unknown 5
Klimatarier CO2 Rechner Milch
1.44
 Unknown Unknown 5
Mat-klimat-listan Variation 0.8-2.5
1.0
 Unknown Sweden 6
Den store klimadatabase Milk, whole, 3.5 % fat, Agriculture: 0.48, iLUC: 0.06, Food processing: 0.06, Packaging: 0.08, Transport: 0.11
0.79
 Unknown Unknown 5
The Alpro Sustainable Development Report 2013
1.3
 Unknown Unknown 2
Greenhouse gas emissions from Swedish production of meat, milk and eggs 1990 and 2005 Supplement 9, Table 4a: milk production 2005; at farm gate
1.2
 Sweden Sweden 8
Life Cycle Impacts of Proteinrich Foods for Superwijzer conventional, whole milk
1.31
 Unknown Unknown 4
Greenhouse gas emissions from ruminant supply chains regional emissions range from 1.6 kg CO2-eq/kg FPCM to 9.0 kg CO2-eq/kg. Lower in affluent countries due to better feed, genetics and animal health.
2.8
 Unknown Unknown 10
RIVM Database Milieubelasting Voedingsmiddelen Melk, volle
2.086
 Unknown Netherlands 5
Greenhouse gas emissions from milk production and consumption in the United States: A cradle-to-grave life cycle assessment circa 2008.
2.05
 USA USA 10
Environmental and economic effects of changing to shelf-stable dairy or soy milk for the breakfast in the classroom program Table 1
1.969
 USA USA 9
Comparative life cycle assessment of milk and plant-based alternatives
2.75
 USA USA 10
Umweltwirkungen der Ernährung-Ökobilanzierung des Nahrungsmittelverbrauchs tierischer Produkte nach Gesellschaftsgruppen in Deutschland Table 1
1.56
 Germany Germany 8
How low can we go? An assessment of greenhouse gas emissions from the UK food system and the scope reduction by 2050 Milk, whole, fresh
1.19
 United Kingdom United Kingdom 4

Recipes

*only recipes with more than 50 grams of Milk are shown.
Recipes