JAPANESE SAVANT WORKS TO CUT COW BURP METHANE BY 80%

Cow burps expel large amounts of methane, a gas with 25 times the greenhouse effect of carbon dioxide and a significant global-warming contributor. But one research team is working toward achieving decarbonization by trying to eliminate 80% of cow belches' methane content by 2050, Taiki Asakawa reported for Mainichi Shimbun.

Cow stomachs have four compartments; after they swallow food such as hay or corn, they repeatedly ruminate or regurgitate, to chew it further. The rumen, its largest stomach compartment, is a "fermentation tank" home to about 8,000 types of microorganisms that digest difficult-to-decompose fibers.

This process generates methane-filled fermentation gas belches. "It is estimated that one dairy cow produces burps about 1,800 liters a day, with methane gas accounting for around 500 liters," said a National Agriculture and Food Research Organization representative.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, in fiscal 2019 the agriculture, forestry and fisheries sector produced greenhouse gases equivalent to about 47.47 million tons of carbon dioxide. Of this, 7.56 million tons, some 15.9%, was due to "fermentation in the digestive tracts of livestock" -- or cattle's belches.

Project team head Yasuo Kobayashi is a professor of animal function and nutrition at the graduate school of Hokkaido University. "For nearly 50 years now reduction of cow burps' methane has been sparsely studied by a handful of researchers."

The research's focus was initially unrelated to averting global warming, but rather on finding ways to reduce cattle feed. Basic research was apparently going ahead under the impression that if the energy used in digestion to produce methane could be saved, cattle might be raised with less feed.

"There are three research subjects," explains Kobayashi. First is the discovery of new ingredients to add to cattle feed. In previous studies, liquid produced from squeezed cashew nut shells was mixed with feed to reduce methane by up to 20%. But the nuts are procured from Southeast Asia, making widespread uptake of the practice difficult.

Currently, the team is investigating some 20 new ingredient candidates that can be more cheaply obtained in Japan.

Kobayashi said, "We are focusing on chemical substances used as food additives. Mass production at factories is possible, and it seems we could commercialize them cheaply in future."

The second task is breeding low methane cattle. Methane amounts exhaled differ by the animal, with some expelling less methane even when eating the same food. "Since these are inherited characteristics, we can expect a 10% to 15% methane reduction by improving the breed," explained Kobayashi.

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