CARB declares it the “perfect complement to the state’s LCFS and Cap-and-Trade programs”
From Tweet to Policy, in Under 2 Years

The California Air Resources Board (CARB) launches its pathbreaking Vegan Carbon Offset Program (VCOP) today. Initially derided by one state lawmaker as “the dumbest idea to come out of the pandemic,” the concept caught fire after social media influencers embraced the plan.

Vegan restauranteur and Chico native Alvin Jersey thought he was being funny when he tweeted, “If farmers can get paid to collect cow poop, why can’t I get paid to not poop cows?” The thought-provoking comment, accompanied by a GIF showing an adorable kitten sitting on a cow’s head, went viral. And the #NoCowPoop movement was born.

Calls for a ballot referendum caught the eye of state legislators, who brought the matter to CARB’s attention. “We were liking what we were seeing,” said CARB Chair Liane Randolph, who then clarified, “I don’t mean all of it, some of the Tik-Tok livestock videos were really inappropriate, but the underlying concept was sound.” Randolph created a task force that quickly designed the VCOP policy. Under it, California residents can earn carbon offset credits for going vegan. The proposed rulemaking was published last February and over 92% of public comments were favorable. Governor Newsom touted the projected 5% drop in agricultural methane emissions at a rally in March.

CARB staffers and VCOP task force members Gretchen Holstein and Jed Vaca said drafting the policy proved challenging. Life cycle analysis required a reduction in the number of credits due to carbon leakage, explained Holstein: “Participants, embracing a healthy vegan lifestyle, are projected to live an average of three years longer, extending their overall carbon footprint and partially offsetting their reductions.”

The greatest debates focused on the issue policy makers refer to as “additionality,” explained Vaca. “Some of the new vegans probably would have become vegans anyway, thus some of the emissions reductions from the program would not be additional reductions.” To solve for that problem, CARB ultimately turned to vegan allies in Silicon Valley. Their contacts at Meta took only two weeks to create an AI-powered bot that will analyze each enrollee’s social media accounts, financial records, genetic code, and grocery and restaurant receipts to determine whether the enrollee qualifies. “You don’t qualify if the analysis shows that you would become a vegan [without the program] or if it shows that you won’t stick with it,” stated a Meta programmer, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “We just need the enrollee’s telephone number to tell.”

Ironically, the only organized opposition to the program came from the primary beneficiaries of CARB’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS). Factory farmers worried that a decrease in demand for meat and dairy would hurt their supplemental income. “Income from meat and dairy production is secondary, sure, but it’s still an important supplement to the income CAFOs make by raising the cattle that produce methane for the LCFS,” said one long-time industry observer, referring to concentrated animal feeding operations.

Some put it more bluntly. “Pure bullshit,” declared the COO of Happy VooMoo, Iowa’s largest CAFO operator. “This new program perversely affects our perverse incentive,” he complained, regretting he had ever “played along with the sustainability brigade.” “Our massive poop lagoons weren’t hurting anything but the air and the water,” he insisted, then conceded, “and maybe the land and climate a little. And the animals. And maybe rural communities in general.”

Interestingly, automakers lobbied hard for the program. On a conference call with analysts, Ford’s CFO observed: “We expect the VCOP to help our efforts at cost containment. Most supply chain news these days is terrible—this is different. We’ve seen a huge shift in consumer sentiment in recent years away from traditional leather toward vegan leather. California’s move to boost the domestic supply of vegans is sure to help us meet that demand.”

CARB’s must-read policy summary is available here.