Placeholder Image

Subtitles section Play video

  • There are about 1.5 billion cows on this planet.

  • That's one cow for every five people on Earth.

  • We keep them for dairy... and meat...

  • and they're a climate problem that we've struggled to solve.

  • Every year, each one of those cows is estimated

  • to release up to 220 pounds of methane...

  • mostly when they burp.

  • That's about 4% of all greenhouse gas emissions that are warming our planet...

  • from burping cows.

  • You've probably heard a few solutions to this

  • like trying to convince people to lower their beef intake...

  • or switch to meat alternatives.

  • But instead of trying to convince billions of humans to change their diets

  • some researchers are focusing on the diet of the cows.

  • And a promising solution might come in the form...

  • of seaweed.

  • This video is presented by Delta Airlines.

  • One of the reasons cows produce so much methane

  • is because of their specialized digestive tract.

  • It allows them to digest tough plant material

  • like grass, hay, and other vegetation.

  • Their stomach consists of four compartments.

  • The largest one, the rumen

  • acts sort of as a storage unit where food can sit and ferment.

  • Microbes in this area break down the food

  • using a process called enteric fermentation.

  • This process provides the animal with the nutrients and energy it needs

  • but it also produces methane as waste...

  • and the cow burps it out...

  • which makes the Earth a little bit hotter.

  • Here's the thing, though methane is literally waste...

  • and changing the diet of the cow can change

  • how much of it is produced.

  • Foods like grass or hay stay in the rumen longer

  • and produce more of it.

  • Whereas carbohydrate rich foods like corn produce less methane.

  • But the goal here isn't to completely change

  • the diet of all of these cows that we're feeding.

  • We can just tweak it a little.

  • We've been doing a lot of work on feed additives

  • to try to reduce synthetic methane emissions.

  • Ermias Kebreab is the associate dean at UC Davis

  • in the College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences.

  • In 2018, he led a study that tested

  • how cows reacted to a certain additive...

  • Seaweed.

  • Specifically red seaweed.

  • Which grows naturally in tropical and subtropical ocean regions.

  • Back in 2016, researchers in Australia had found that sprinkling

  • the seaweed on cow feed could potentially reduce

  • methane emissions by over 95%.

  • And in 2021, Kebreab and his team were able

  • to replicate the study in live animals in California.

  • That completely blew my mind when I saw how effective it was.

  • The final results found that the seaweed could reduce

  • methane emissions by 82%.

  • At first I couldn't believe it because I...

  • I've never seen anything like that before.

  • And this specific species of red seaweed contains

  • high amounts of a compound called bromoform.

  • When a cow ingests it

  • it suppresses the enzyme that makes methane.

  • And the cows

  • they don't even notice the change in their dinners.

  • The seaweed is dried

  • and sprinkled onto the food they're used to.

  • They can still get all the nutrients they need.

  • Produce milk and grow.

  • But the waste is reduced.

  • Other additives work too, like fatty acids

  • which reduce methane by lowering the carbohydrate content

  • and reducing a specific parasite in the rumen known as protozoa.

  • And oregano was found to reduce

  • the number of bacteria in the rumen

  • to limit methane production.

  • But so far, out of all the additives tested

  • seaweed has been the most effective.

  • The best news is that scaling up the growth of seaweed

  • doesn't technically drain other resources

  • like fresh water or fertilizer...

  • since we can grow it in the ocean.

  • Growing seaweed could also combat other issues

  • like ocean acidification...

  • another climate problem caused by rising levels of carbon dioxide.

  • But there's still a lot of research left to do...

  • including figuring out how to dry it and package it

  • and ship it at a low cost.

  • Like, how do we effectively get seaweed

  • from a subtropical area to, say... Maine...

  • without adding tons of emissions with shipping?

  • That is, if you didn't know that seaweed is super heavy when wet.

  • But once we figure out the logistics, it's over.

  • We solved it.

  • The cows are content and the planet is saved.

  • Except not at all, obviously.

  • For one, this doesn't appear to be a one size fits all solution.

  • Recently, another Australian study

  • found that the same red seaweed only cut methane emissions by under 30%.

  • Now, granted, that's still a reduction, which is good news

  • but may be less of a miracle than we hoped.

  • Others are urging researchers to slow down on red seaweed

  • because of the bromoform .

  • In it's pure form, the EPA has reported

  • that it could be dangerous to human health

  • if ingested.

  • Luckily, studies so far haven't found that at dangerous levels in milk

  • or in meat from cows eating the seaweed additive.

  • But studies still need to be done

  • on how it might affect the cows long term.

  • So it's not a silver bullet...

  • but thankfully seaweed's not our only option.

  • I think this is just one of several solutions

  • that are being looked at at the moment.

  • And overall, there's a big push for change.

  • In 2021, 150 countries, including the United States

  • signed the United Nations Global Methane Pledge...

  • which aims to reduce methane emissions by 30% by 2030.

  • It's becoming more and more clear now that we won't get there...

  • unless we tackle enteric methane emissions.

  • In an ideal world, we'd have less livestock.

  • But getting people to change their habits

  • isn't always the most straightforward or quickest solution.

  • The work of searching for solutions to the climate crisis

  • needs to be multifaceted.

  • Within a year or two, you will see quite

  • a lot of different activities and different solutions.

  • That's going to come up.

  • And that could be one less cow burp at a time.

There are about 1.5 billion cows on this planet.

Subtitles and vocabulary

Click the word to look it up Click the word to find further inforamtion about it