Cycling at work

I saw on television awhile ago an advertisement* stating that the livestock industry (cattle, sheep, goats) is the third largest producer (13% of the total) of global warming gases in Australia. I wont dispute that animals produce methane (CH4) and carbon dioxide (CO2) so they are inevitably part of the problem. I also wont argue with those that say that animals drink water!

What does irritate me is that the sheep on Daramalan have only the water that falls as rain and eat only grass from the property and are given no supplemental feed nor are they kept in large sheds and factory farmed. Grass fed lamb and wool if you like.

The advertisement made it sound as if farm animals (somehow) produce CH4 and CO2 from nothing. In fact they are doing it from (thin) air!! Farm animals are part of the Carbon cycle as carbon is continually cycled from the atmosphere, through the grass the animal eats, through the animal itself and then back into the atmosphere. What goes in goes back out and I accept that they contribute in some small way to global warming issues.

One might even stretch the truth and say that animals are a short term carbon sink as carbon is locked up in the biomass and as the animals reproduce so the carbon sink’s longevity is increased. Not quite on a (tax free) woodlot investment scale where one thirteen year woodlot sequesters 400mt/ha CO2 equivalent to running a car for 100 years.

Atmospheric methane levels are now indisputably higher than ever before. Ice core data indicates that from year 1000 until 1850, the start of the Industrial Revolution, methane levels were fairly stable at 320-790 parts per billion. Since 1850 however, levels have risen sharply to 1732 ppb in the early 1990s and 1774 ppb in 2005.

There is no question that ruminant animal agribusiness does produce methane but to routinely blame it for the whole problem is misleading. Industry and cars are much more to blame. I will have more comments on the Emission Trading Scheme and the whole debate but will save them for a later date. At least until the politicians have some coherent strategy and policy!!

I have asked all the sheep in our flock to breathe half as often to help reduce their carbon emissions. If only the politicians could do the same....

*The advertisement was based on CSIRO research :http://www.climatechange.gov.au/agriculture/publications/pubs/methane_emissions.pdf