Blame The Cows!

• May. 7 by Kimberley Gammon (2)

You may not have realised it but internationally, the meat industry on a whole produces a chunky slice that is 18% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.

This huge slab of pollution is partly down to the carbon dioxide emission caused by fertilization used on the cattle’s feed crop and farm machinery to harvest it. Then there is the shipping of cattle feed to the cows and the shipping of cattle around the world as food for ourselves.

But it doesn’t stop there. A shocking 30 percent of the Methane gas in the atmosphere is caused by Bovine flatulence, but even worse is the fact cattle’s manure also contains the Ozone destroying Nitrous Oxide.

You may not have known this but Methane actually has a global warming effect 23 times that of the bog standard Carbon emission. But Nitrous Oxide is the big daddy of the pollution gasses by having a terrifying 296 times bigger effect on the atmosphere then Carbon, that’s gigantic!

But don’t start blaming the bovines…  it’s partly our fault too. The increasing human population means the demand for beef as food is ever rising, so more and more cattle are bred to keep up with them. As a result the cows are creating their own hoof-print on global warming.