Wednesday, June 24, 2009
(photo: © Duane Mangold,Iowa State University)
Officials at the Environmental Protection Agency have said they want to require the mandatory reporting of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) by large agricultural operations, or factory farms, to monitor the release of such contributors to global warming as methane. But this effort to see how much hog and cattle farms are contributing to methane gas releases is being threatened by Congress.
The House Appropriations Committee last week passed the 2010 Interior and the Environment spending bill, which includes an amendment that will prevent the EPA from requiring factory farms to report their GHG emissions. Some environmentalists have labeled this move “a blatant handout to large factory farms.”
While much of the global warming debate has focused on carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere, environmentalists insist more consideration needs to be given to methane and nitrous oxide, both of which are released from animal manure on farms. According to the EPA, manure is the fifth largest source of methane and the fourth largest source of nitrous oxide in the U.S., and yields more GHG emissions per year than all cement production and more than twice as many emissions as waste incineration and natural gas systems.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
Factory Farms Get the Ultimate Handout (by Meredith Niles, Grist)
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