Cassava vs Tofu: carbon footprint
Cassava1.32kg CO₂e / kg
vs
Tofu3.16kg CO₂e / kg
Cassava or Tofu? Here's what each one costs the climate, measured per kilo over its whole life.
Cassava runs about 1.32 kg CO₂e a kilo. Tofu runs 3.16.
Tofu is the heavier choice, about 2.4× Cassava.
Swap Tofu for Cassava and you cut about 1.84 kg a kilo, near 58% off.
Per kilo, that gap is a 11 km drive in a diesel car.
Cassava: Cheap on carbon, heavy on calories. Storage is the main cost once it's grown.
Tofu: Tofu and soy milk hand you protein at a fraction of beef's footprint. The swap that actually moves the needle.
Per-kilo numbers skip portion size and how the food was farmed, so take them as the shape of things, not the last word.
More match-ups
Figures from OWID / Poore & Nemecek 2018, licensed CC-BY 4.0.
How we get these numbers: Methodology.