An American study has revised upward the methane emissions caused by intensive livestock farming. The consequences for the climate could be devastating.
The methane emissions from livestock farming activities, which share responsibility for global warming and climate change, are more significant than previously thought. This is explained by a scientific study published at the end of September in the journal Carbon Balance and Management, according to which the figure for 2011 is a full eleven percentage points higher than previous estimates. Those earlier estimates were based on old data published by the Ipcc (Intergovernmental panel on climate change), which date back more than ten years.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5e2H1LStFPk
"In many regions of the world, the number of livestock has grown. And the animals themselves are increasingly larger in size, which means, as a consequence, that they need to eat greater quantities of food. To this must be added certain changes that have taken place in livestock management systems: all of this explains the increase in emissions," said to the French daily 20Minutes Julie Wolf, a researcher at the United States Department of Agriculture and lead author of the report.
The problem is far from trivial: methane is a greenhouse gas that persists in the atmosphere for less time than CO2, but which — during the period in which it is active — is capable of producing warming 25 times greater than that generated by carbon dioxide. In other words, it is a particularly dangerous factor for global climate stability. As far back as 2015, the Ipcc had already highlighted how methane accounts for 16 per cent of the mix of greenhouse gases present in the atmosphere.
The finger is pointed in particular at regions experiencing rapid economic development: "Methane emissions from livestock farming," noted Hassem Asrar, director of the Joint Global Change Research Institute in Maryland, "have grown strongly above all in Asia, Latin America and Africa. By contrast, increases are less pronounced in the United States and Canada, while a slight decline has been recorded in Western Europe."
According to the daily Le Monde, Dave Reay, a lecturer at the University of Edinburgh, commented on the study's findings by recalling how the crux of the matter is linked to a cultural change that humanity must confront in terms of eating habits. "Humanity," he explained, "is eating ever more meat and dairy products, which has particularly serious consequences for the environment. We need to understand that, in the fight against climate change, reducing methane emissions from livestock farming is as important as building wind turbines or solar panels."