usernamesAreTricky

When we look at the most common extraction method for soybean oil (using hexane solvents), soybean meal [feed to farm animals] is still the driver of demand

However, soybean meal is the main driving force for soybean oil production due to its significant amount of productivity and revenues

[...]

soybean meal and hulls contribute to over 60% of total revenues, with meal taking the largest portion of over 59% of total revenue

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0926669017305010

This is even more true of other methods like expelling which is still somewhat commonly used

Moreover, soybean meal is the driving force for the whole process [expelling oil from soy] because it provides over 70% of the total revenue for soy processing by expelling

https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/9/5/87

Even other extraction methods being explored in research as well don't have soybean oil as the main driver of demand

From the results, soybean oil makes up around 24% of total revenues; revenue from insoluble fiber makes over 70%, due to the large amounts produced throughout the process. [of Enzyme-Assisted Aqueous Extraction]

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jasreen-Sekhon/publication/330375817_Economic_Feasibility_of_Soybean_Oil_Production_by_Enzyme-Assisted_Aqueous_Extraction_Processing/links/5c49d531a6fdccd6b5c586b6/Economic-Feasibility-of-Soybean-Oil-Production-by-Enzyme-Assisted-Aqueous-Extraction-Processing.pdf

Rather than just waiting for it to happen, we can put the pressure to make it happen. Groups like Indivisible are putting pressure on Dems to step up more and Republicans to step up at all

They pressure is starting to change dem's actions. They have started using more aggressively using some procedural tools to slow down senate confirmations (can't fully block without republican votes). For instance, they denied unanimous consent and held the floor for the 30 hours against Russel Vought (and I believe RFK too)

Where they emit the most methane and still are given supplementary feed. There's also not enough land to sustain a grazing only production system with the massive demand we have

We model a nationwide transition [in the US] from grain- to grass-finishing systems using demographics of present-day beef cattle. In order to produce the same quantity of beef as the present-day system, we find that a nationwide shift to exclusively grass-fed beef would require increasing the national cattle herd from 77 to 100 million cattle, an increase of 30%. We also find that the current pastureland grass resource can support only 27% of the current beef supply (27 million cattle), an amount 30% smaller than prior estimates

[...]

Taken together, an exclusively grass-fed beef cattle herd would raise the United States’ total methane emissions by approximately 8%.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aad401/pdf

1 kg of meat requires 2.8 kg of human-edible feed for ruminants and 3.2 for monogastrics

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2211912416300013

we show that plant-based replacements for each of the major animal categories in the United States (beef, pork, dairy, poultry, and eggs) can produce twofold to 20-fold more nutritionally similar food per unit cropland. Replacing all animal-based items with plant-based replacement diets can add enough food to feed 350 million additional people, more than the expected benefits of eliminating all supply chain food loss.

https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.1713820115

It's worth noting that environmentally, where the food comes from matters far far less than what you eat. Production emissions are far larger than any transportation emissions

Transport is a small contributor to emissions. For most food products, it accounts for less than 10%, and it’s much smaller for the largest GHG emitters. In beef from beef herds, it’s 0.5%.

Not just transport, but all processes in the supply chain after the food left the farm – processing, transport, retail and packaging – mostly account for a small share of emissions.

This data shows that this is the case when we look at individual food products. But studies also shows that this holds true for actual diets; here we show the results of a study which looked at the footprint of diets across the EU. Food transport was responsible for only 6% of emissions, whilst dairy, meat and eggs accounted for 83%.

https://ourworldindata.org/food-choice-vs-eating-local

Still results in overall reductions in arable-land usage. Even more than just eliminating 100% of food-waste

we show that plant-based replacements for each of the major animal categories in the United States (beef, pork, dairy, poultry, and eggs) can produce twofold to 20-fold more nutritionally similar food per unit cropland. Replacing all animal-based items with plant-based replacement diets can add enough food to feed 350 million additional people, more than the expected benefits of eliminating all supply chain food loss.

https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.1713820115

Grazing usage isn't free from harms either

Livestock farmers often claim that their grazing systems “mimic nature”. If so, the mimicry is a crude caricature. A review of evidence from over 100 studies found that when livestock are removed from the land, the abundance and diversity of almost all groups of wild animals increases

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/aug/16/most-damaging-farm-products-organic-pasture-fed-beef-lamb

It scales far better than animal-agriculture. Eating plants directly is massively more efficient compared to growing crops feed where most of the energy is lost in the process

The research suggests that it’s possible to feed everyone in the world a nutritious diet on existing croplands, but only if we saw a widespread shift towards plant-based diets.

[...]

If everyone shifted to a plant-based diet we would reduce global land use for agriculture by 75%. This large reduction of agricultural land use would be possible thanks to a reduction in land used for grazing and a smaller need for land to grow crops.

https://ourworldindata.org/land-use-diets

Transitioning to plant-based diets (PBDs) has the potential to reduce diet-related land use by 76%, diet-related greenhouse gas emissions by 49%, eutrophication by 49%, and green and blue water use by 21% and 14%, respectively, whilst garnering substantial health co-benefits

[...]

Plant-based foods have a significantly smaller footprint on the environment than animal-based foods. Even the least sustainable vegetables and cereals cause less environmental harm than the lowest impact meat and dairy products [9].

https://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/14/8/1614/html

Multiple agencies are now also doing the same thing. I find it unlikely this was planned by DOGE as it is massively embarrassing to Musk and makes him look weak

Them fighting each other also give them less time to do horrible things. Yes, they will still do some bad things while they fight, but it takes up some of their time and hurts their sense of unity. It reduces the damage a bit. It also inspires other outside the government to fight back too

Every little bit of delay and harm reduction is something we're going to need

EDIT: also worth mentioning that now other agencies are also pushing against musk now that Patel is. Resistance is often something that spreads once it is normalized

Think that would be good to edit the post to show that image instead

There's more than just that. It was just an example that I had recalled off the top of my head. On many of those important issues, they're at the very minimum worried about said lawsuit enough to change some of their actions

For instance, as of a few hours ago they just moved all recent Immigrants out of Guantanamo. (Though make sure to watch for them not to try and do it again when the public backlash has calmed down)

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/trump-administration-seems-clear-migrants-guantanamo-bay-rcna193067

This is not me trying to claim they are some law-abiding people. This is me saying they still fear the courts to some degree, so we should keep using that as a tool to push back. Lawsuits are still worth pursuing

They mostly are following court orders for the moment. They are deliberately misinterpretating some orders, but they aren't yet 100% ignoring the courts

For instance

The Trump administration restores federal webpages after court order