Australian Trial of Seaweed Cow Feed Fails To Achieve Hoped-For Methane Cuts (theguardian.com) 56
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: One of the world's longest commercial trials of a seaweed supplement that the global meat industry hopes could slash methane from beef cattle has recorded much lower reductions in the potent greenhouse gas than previous studies. Putting the supplement into the diets of 40 wagyu cattle in an Australian feedlot for 300 days cut the methane they produced by 28%. The supplement was derived from the red seaweed species Asparagopsis, which has been widely promoted as being able to cut methane by more than 80%, with some experiments suggesting reductions as high as 96%.
Globally, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization estimates, methane from burping cattle -- known as enteric emissions -- releases about 2.1 billion tons of CO2-equivalent a year, compared with the 37.5 billion tons of CO2 from burning fossil fuels. But because methane is about 80 times more potent than CO2 at warming the planet over a 20-year period, cutting methane is seen as a way to slow global heating faster. The trial, reported by the red meat industry's marketing and research group Meat and Livestock Australia (MLA), also found animals given the supplement ate less food and weighed 15kg less by the time they were sent for slaughter. Dr Fran Cowley, a livestock scientist at the University of New England who led the trial, said it was the longest run so far using the red seaweed. She said more research was needed to understand why the wagyu in the trial had not delivered the same level of emissions reductions as other experiments.
One factor could be the way the methane was measured in the trial, which used an open-air system in a feedlot compared with animals measured in dedicated indoor chambers. But the trial report noted that other experiments over shorter timeframes using the same open-air measurement technique had recorded higher methane reductions. The seaweed was freeze-dried, mixed in canola oil and added to the animals' feed. In this trial it was given to the animals at slightly lower concentrations than other experiments that showed much higher methane reductions. Cowley said it was also not clear why the animals on the supplement ate less food and put on weight more slowly. Accounting for the extra 35 days the animals would have taken to reach the same weight would have theoretically meant the emissions savings were cut from 28% to 19% as they would have been alive for longer, all the time emitting methane. The study also found that the seaweed supplement had no effect on the wagyu's flavor or other properties.
Globally, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization estimates, methane from burping cattle -- known as enteric emissions -- releases about 2.1 billion tons of CO2-equivalent a year, compared with the 37.5 billion tons of CO2 from burning fossil fuels. But because methane is about 80 times more potent than CO2 at warming the planet over a 20-year period, cutting methane is seen as a way to slow global heating faster. The trial, reported by the red meat industry's marketing and research group Meat and Livestock Australia (MLA), also found animals given the supplement ate less food and weighed 15kg less by the time they were sent for slaughter. Dr Fran Cowley, a livestock scientist at the University of New England who led the trial, said it was the longest run so far using the red seaweed. She said more research was needed to understand why the wagyu in the trial had not delivered the same level of emissions reductions as other experiments.
One factor could be the way the methane was measured in the trial, which used an open-air system in a feedlot compared with animals measured in dedicated indoor chambers. But the trial report noted that other experiments over shorter timeframes using the same open-air measurement technique had recorded higher methane reductions. The seaweed was freeze-dried, mixed in canola oil and added to the animals' feed. In this trial it was given to the animals at slightly lower concentrations than other experiments that showed much higher methane reductions. Cowley said it was also not clear why the animals on the supplement ate less food and put on weight more slowly. Accounting for the extra 35 days the animals would have taken to reach the same weight would have theoretically meant the emissions savings were cut from 28% to 19% as they would have been alive for longer, all the time emitting methane. The study also found that the seaweed supplement had no effect on the wagyu's flavor or other properties.
Are they accounting for poop? (Score:5, Interesting)
One factor could be the way the methane was measured in the trial, which used an open-air system in a feedlot compared with animals measured in dedicated indoor chambers.
Feedlots are known for having whole swamps of cowshit, which produce methane as they decompose. You can put it into a vessel (like one of those water storage bags) and easily capture the methane, but almost nobody is doing this. Putting it into a container raises the temperatures and causes decomposition to occur more quickly, and destroys most pathogens...
Re: Are they accounting for poop? (Score:2)
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Anonymous Cowards will not be replied to.
It seems they were.
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It was moderated "-1 flamebait" which I thought was very unfair, ...
Welcome to /.
Re: Wasted that mod point (offfopic, but meta) (Score:2)
I am biased of course, but I think trying to achieve a specific result like that on slashdot is hopeless. I am also being reliably modded down three times by the same party almost every day and have been for weeks, so what you ultimately did there was choose not to be a force opposing moderation abuse on slashdot.
Re:Are they accounting for poop? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Or maybe it's because they ate less, and were fed seaweed at lower concentrations than other trials. There's no point in making uneducated guesses, these were not controlled trials against each other to isolate factors. There are many potential reasons for the differences. The trials had literally nothing in common with each other other than the word "seaweed". More information and further study is needed.
Re: Are they accounting for poop? (Score:1)
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Better than nothing. (Score:4)
Re:Better than nothing. (Score:4, Funny)
Certainly nothing to sniff at.
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Ha ha ha!
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Too pricey? As compared to the damage everyone suffers from because of climate change?
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With Australia being subject to drought an alterntive food source may be valuable all on it's own.
Omg (Score:3)
Typical health food (Score:3)
Tastes like shit and does about 30% of what it claims to do.
Re:Typical health food (Score:5, Insightful)
30% of what it claims to do is way better than most health foods.
Bromoform (Score:5, Interesting)
I've been following this company for a few years now (I work in animal agriculture) with great interest, but they have yet to address the possible environmental contamination with bromine/bromoform. Nor have they adequately addressed reports from other labs that the bromoform can be transferred to dairy products [nih.gov].
This study is in beef animals, and I think the risks of bio-accumulation in that context are lower than in milk, but it is still something they will need to address before they can be considered safe. I hope they can sort this all out, becuase we do need methane mitigation solutions, but I'm not confident. They wrote a rebuttal of sorts to the report of bromoform transfer to milk that to my eye was a rather long winded "nu-uh". Lots of text, but not really substantive counter arguments were presented (can't find a link at the moment).
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Seriously, thank you for this vital piece of information.
Plenty of other tasty things to eat besides meat that provides the same nutrition
Looks like eating something else is the way to go. Reduce climate change and avoid one more carcinogen at the same time.
All The Shit Humans Pump Into The Air (Score:2)
And we are worried about cowfarts? WTF!!
Re:All The Shit Humans Pump Into The Air (Score:4, Insightful)
https://origin-awswest-www.epa... [epa.gov].
Researchers have found that 37% of methane emissions from human activity are the direct result of our livestock and agricultural practices.
Methane is a potent greenhouse gas and meat production makes up a lot of our output of it so this does in fact make some sense as long as it works.
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Yep has nothing at all to do with a 2.1million ton emission load. It's all about those damn vegans. That's why they are *checks notes* feeding cows to make sure we can continue ... eating ... them?
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And we are worried about cowfarts? WTF!!
No. We're worried about cow burps. Cow burps that contribute 2.1 billion CO2 equivalent emissions to the atmosphere due to ... *looks up what we use cows for* human industrialisation of cow farming.
Livestock is tiny compared to other sectors ... (Score:5, Interesting)
There has been a constant barrage on how not eating meat will save the planet, and companies that push vegetable based meat alternatives have latched onto that.
But according to this chart from 2016 [ourworldindata.org] livestock (and manure) is barely 5.8% of the total CO2 equivalent.
If you look at other sectors, then fugitive emissions from energy production is exactly the same 5.8%. Other sectors such as energy use for commercial and residential buildings, road transport, iron and steel and others all surpass the 5.8% considerably.
I am not saying that green house gas emission from livestock production should be ignored. It should be addressed, but in parallel, more aggressive measures should be taken in sectors that provide more oomph for green house gases, rather than shifting the blame to beef.
For example, addressing the escaped methane from oil wells should be a priority as well as electrification of transport, ...etc.
Another thing that gets a lot of blame, is aviation, which only accounts for 1.9% in the same chart. But you always see disproportionate coverage of flying and its effect on global warming, ...etc.
The energy companies' strategy of shifting blame from fossil fuel production and use is working great ...
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Australia needs nuclear power to replace fossil fuels. Renewable energy is not reliable enough to provide the energy Australia needs. This is true in much of the world, pretty much any place lacking huge amounts of hydro power will need nuclear power to lower their CO2 emissions and maintain their standard of living.
Re: Livestock is tiny compared to other sectors .. (Score:2)
Australia is one of the world's best places for solar and wind power. You are full of something bovine-related as per usual.
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Some experts with a lot more knowledge about it than you or I already looked into this and decided it wasn't going to help us hit our targets.
Page 37 of the net zero report, that was released last month:
https://www.netzeroaustralia.n... [netzeroaustralia.net.au]
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But according to this chart from 2016 [ourworldindata.org] livestock (and manure) is barely 5.8% of the total CO2 equivalent.
If you look at other sectors, then fugitive emissions from energy production is exactly the same 5.8%. Other sectors such as energy use for commercial and residential buildings, road transport, iron and steel and others all surpass the 5.8% considerably.
Well, depending on how you split the pie, every segment by itself is insignificant. Even then, 5.8% is more than shipping and aviation combined: https://ourworldindata.org/emi... [ourworldindata.org]
We should do what we can everywhere, especially if it's something as simple as replacing cow feed with algae (if it worked, at least).
That said, I think the easiest thing to focus on is just fossil fuels. It's literally just how much coal and oil/gas we burn. We can replace the vast majority of uses, such as energy generation, heati
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IMHO there's also this idea of the 'other person' is mostly responsible, and they should do something. Taking myself for example. I consider myself a relatively low energy/CO2 impacting person (shameless virtue signaling) . And occasional use of those energy usage/emissions calculator reinforces that view. I plug in my electricity/gas bill, the car and mileage, diet, pets, kids, etc and out pops a number. I'm doing awesome (pat on back) and all those people that eat cheeseburgers every day, or drive
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1) In Africa, India and the Middle East. Everywhere else is pretty close to replacment or below.
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You are right.
Most likely it is this FAO report [fao.org], which puts it at 14.5%.
The exact percentage per other studies [thebreakthrough.org] ranges from ~ 11% to ~ 19%.
On the other hand, the EPA says [epa.gov] that all of agriculture, including livestock is only 10% as a whole.
No idea why livestock is only 5.8%, and all of agriculture is 18.4% in the Our World In Data visualization ...
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There has been a constant barrage on how not eating meat will save the planet
No there hasn't. There's been recognition that meat production is in fact a problem and precisely zero people think we can solve climate change simply by reducing meat.
is barely 5.8% of the total CO2 equivalent.
I feel like you don't really understand how incredibly fucking significant 5.8% is. To be clear that would be the equivalent of taking over 1 billion cars off the road, or 2/3rds of commuter vehicles across the entire planet.
Everything sounds like nothing when you dice it up to single digits and put a percent sign behind it. How about instead
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Starship Integrated Launch Test (Score:1)
A guaranteed way to lower methane emissions (Score:2, Flamebait)
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Even better, stop eating altogether.
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Even better, stop eating altogether.
That would solve both the methane problem and the global overpopulation problem, right?
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Oh damn! (Score:2)
Another silver bullet turns out to be lead.
Did the study length == a cow's lifespan? (Score:2)
If they could get that 28% up to 1/3 and guarantee it for the life of the cow that would not be too bad.
Pair that with encouraging people to make ever third meal where they would have eaten meat to eat something else and you will have a 2/3 reduction.
On the other hand (Score:2)
I'm against (intensive) industrialized livestock production, predominantly because of its effects on the consumer's health.
That said, there's been some study in recent years that shows that extensive livestock production seems to improve the ecosystem's carbon capturing capacity, by providing biomass as well as microorganisms to the soil, which move the biomass underground (in addition to the hoove action of the livestock), where soil microorganisms now proliferating due to the food abundance, thus creatin