Agriculture & climate change

Greenhouse gases

Agriculture & CO2

CO2(carbon dioxide):

.Mechanized agricultural practices

.Transportation

.Fertilizer production

.Processing and packaging

.Deforestation

Methane: Livestock digestion and manure.

Enteric fermentation is part of the process of ruminant animals such as cattle. This enables them to digest complex carbohydrates that other animals cannot. A byproduct of this is methane released as belching or flatulence.

A cow on overage release between 70 and 120 kg of Methane per year. Methane is a greenhouse gas like carbon dioxide (CO2). But the negative effect on the climate of Methane is 23 times higher than the effect of CO2. Therefore the release of about 100 kg Methane per year for each cow is equivalent to about 2'300 kg CO2 per year.

Because of the huge volume of manure in large scale livestock production manure is stored in “manure lagoons” as the manure breaks down methane is released

Agriculture & Methane

Agriculture & N2O

Sythetic fertilizers are often nitrogen or ammonia based which casues N2O emmisions from microbes in the soil.

Nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions occur as a result of soil microbial activity.

Nitrification is an aerobic (oxygen present) process that converts ammonium (NH4) into nitrate (NO3) with N2O as a by–product

Denitrification is an anaerobic (oxygen absent) process that converts nitrate (NO3) into nitrogen gas (N2) with N2O being produced as an intermediate product.

N2O is approximately 300 times more potent GHG that CO2

What can be done?

Transitioning to organic agriculture: No Synthetic Fertilizers or pesticides less N2O and less CO2

Local food production: reduces transportation mileage less CO2

Smaller farms more people less machines, Less need for mechanized methods.

Eat less meat: the huge demand for meat creates the need for enormous amounts of livestock production which means methane emissions and deforestation.