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EPA and UN eclipse logic with methane gaslighting.
by John Klar
The slander of cows for their existential threat to humanity has focused on methane emissions, which allegedly warm the planet unsustainably. This dubious claim is premised on the sketchy logic that methane production negates any beneficial bovine ecological impacts (especially of urine and manure) and ignores the effects on the environment and food system if cows were to be eliminated. Recent claims that greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from cattle and other livestock are “more potent” than that of cars display another climate cult sleight of hand, which turns a blind eye to toxic industrial pollution that is far more harmful than carbon dioxide or methane.
Carbon vs Methane
The serpentine path to demonizing cows as more environmentally harmful than muscle cars is charted using the special GHG calculus of weighted impacts of carbon dioxide and methane. According to the EPA, transportation generates some 35% of US carbon dioxide emissions, constituting 80% of total US GHG emissions. But methane, which comprises 11.1% of these emissions, is alleged to be more potent, and the EPA identifies livestock as the nation’s largest producer thereof: Ergo, cows are “worse” than cars.
In vilifying bovines, the EPA blames the animals’ biology for what is unnaturally created by the industrial management practices used to house and feed them. Cows rotationally grazed on well-managed pastures prevent erosion by building soils, feeding the microbiome, and increasing water retention – through manure, urine, and grazing activity that nurture plant growth and carbon sequestration. All these activities stimulate microbial life, sequestering carbon, nitrogen, and methane (more than cows emit via burping). Cows are much more than their methane footprint!
This methane metric is demonstrated at the EPA’s website:
“Domestic livestock such as cattle, swine, sheep, and goats produce CH4 as part of their normal digestive process. Also, when animal manure is stored or managed in lagoons or holding tanks, CH4 is produced. Because humans raise these animals for food and other products, the emissions are considered human-related. The Agriculture sector is the largest source of CH4 emissions in the United States.”
The operative phrase “when animal manure is stored or managed in lagoons or holding tanks” reveals that the EPA counts all bovines as Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation (CAFO) cows. Humans who regeneratively “raise these animals for food and other products” sequester carbon year-round anthropogenically. It is industrial agriculture that has created artificial lagoons and polluting tanks, not cows grazing as they have for eons without blowing up the universe with a flatulence-fired heatwave.
Manure Deniers
The EPA’s methane metric as applied to livestock exposes another gross flaw in its climate calculus: If cows – whether CAFO or naturally pastured – are eliminated from the US food chain, increased synthetic fertilizer production will be required to replace the manure lost in the bovine-phobic frenzy to eradicate cow burps and flatulence. Synthetic fertilizers damage rather than nurture soil microbes, increase erosion and water loss, and generate GHG nitrous oxide in manufacture. EPA reports:
“Nitrous oxide molecules stay in the atmosphere for an average of 121 years before being removed by a sink or destroyed through chemical reactions. The impact of 1 pound of N2O on warming the atmosphere is 265 times that of 1 pound of carbon dioxide.”
Using their sad-sack logic, the EPA and the manure deniers claim cows are “worse than cars” because methane is worse than carbon dioxide, so cows must be replaced with synthetic fertilizers that destroy soils and emit nitrous oxide, which is far more harmful than methane or carbon. This dismisses the animals’ lost milk and meat, converted from God’s solar panels (renewable energy called “grass”) into healthy food and rural economic growth.
Cows vs Cars
Though all cows are basically the same biological creatures, their management determines whether they are a net benefit or a detriment to the ecosystem. Similarly, cars share many of the same basic attributes: EVs and gas-powered vehicles all require coal-fired steel plants, mining, paints, plastics, chemicals, rubbers, and smelting of various metals that are exempted from the carbon-centric rubric of the climate cult, while the forever chemicals they generate escape into the water and air Americans drink and breathe. EVs and gas-powered cars all end up together in junkyards and landfills.
Yet like CAFO versus rotationally grazed bovines, electric or hybrid cars and their combustion-powered cousins are very different environmental animals: Tires on EVs wear 30% faster than gas-powered cars, their massive batteries pose far greater environmental problems in mining and disposal than their 12-volt forebears, and they burn fossil fuels through the electric grid rather than directly from a service station. The environmental movement and EPA do not categorize EVs and gas-powered cars as equals in their carbon-focused diktats but as opposites in the battle against climate change. Traditionally, husbanded beef and dairy cows are far superior at carbon sequestration than a $70,000 government-subsidized EV or solar panel will ever be. They sequester carbon and feed the soil throughout their lives and again at death – unlike the “renewable” industrial fabrications that will have to be landfilled and replaced with yet more toxic manufacturing.
Cows are not worse for the planet than cars. What is dangerous for the planet is an ideology that would replace natural processes like grass-blade photosynthesis with solar panels, animal meat with synthetic lab goo, and human choice with carbon-obsessed totalitarianism. And in the end, people can’t eat cars.
The author is a Brookfield best-selling author, lawyer, farmer and pastor.
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Categories: Commentary, Environment
If the UN Agenda 2020/30/50 were a human being, the personality would be called malignant narcissist — you’ll have to look that up on ‘wellmind’ which has a lovely graphic of what one of those looks like.
In a healthy society, that person would be cut out of the herd and isolated so they could not do any harm. One of the characteristics of narcissists is that people die around them — from neglect, from sadistic and torturous gaslighting, induced trauma, and lots and lots of word salads… all to get their own way.
The whole end game for the UN Agenda driven by AI algorithms is to end ANYTHING living… because LIFE produces…errrrmmmm… exudates/effluence/excretions/dumpings… of… what goes in comes out… its a PERFECT harmoniously balanced SYSTEM… and we are ending it with our hubris, arrogance and pride.
We are participating in our demise by accepting pure bull meant to keep us in a catchup mode, frustrated and misunderstood, and most of all, having our true needs met… in THIS system, having those needs met precludes getting along with the system itself, in other words, sucking up. Whew… and there you have it.
It stinks doesn’t it?
That’s the dark one’s world… and those flying monkeys he deploys into our town and villages and State… are doing his work… and you can just die if you don’t like it. AI and our state legislators job would be done. And they can enjoy the sterile, lifeless planet they’ve upended over the one built by the Creator… in their plastic bubbles…free of pesky exudates, bugs, dirt, grass clippings, and mulch… ugh. NOT my LIFE.
I find the argument interesting seems it’s more of a case of false data generated by people that divulge narratives based on hype rather than concrete facts. It’s a power trip. Just look at what’s going on with the Earth’s breathing. Methane billows into the atmosphere all around the planet, well established. One such close place is the Bermuda Triangle where ships have suddenly disappeared. Methane is released from the floor bed causing the water to loose buoyancy and the ship(s) sink. Known. Another such place is off Japan in the Pacific. How many countless more? Look at the volcanic emissions being another source. In Alask The Wrangell Mountains are constantly spewing gases. I’ve seen smoke arising from them.
Considering early history of out country before populations exploded. The American Buffalo numbered into the millions and were in many states West to the East coasts. They had to release manure and farts, creating methane. When they were killed off by Bill Cody and etc (pictures show a guy sitting on a great mound of Buffalo heads, in the hundreds of thousands, to eliminate the native population and grab their lands, the methane had to decrease in proportion, yet haven’t seen data that all of a sudden plant and tree growth boomed with better air. The documentary American Buffalo by Ken Burns (of Walpole NH) on PBS shows the demise of the Buffalo and was almost distinct, save for a few lucky ones. I believe of the millions of Buffalo and the New England states were the only place devoid of the Buffalo. I haven’t seen data of how many cattle there are in comparison. I suspect there were more Buffalo at the peak.
Otherwise all this hyperbole about this gas or that gas or cattle being the prime suspect is is mindless Hyperbole to extract power and money from the economy and doesn’t prove nothing. The Earth is a living breathing planet with cycles, consider it. Back in the days of the great Buffalo herds, there were low numbers of people. Now so many it’s hard to feed them all and they produce methane. want to eliminate people as Bill Gates suggests? I suspect an environmentalists fallacy more so. and bureaucrats that take the path of least resistance in learning and mandating.
Interesting article to spearhead factual discussion and exposure.
Just received:
Earth from space: ‘Smoking terror’ volcano that destroyed city 400 years ago burps toxic cloud
https://www.livescience.com/planet-earth/volcanos/earth-from-space-smoking-terror-volcano-that-destroyed-city-400-years-ago-burps-toxic-cloud
From Live Science:
A 2018 astronaut photo shows Nicaragua’s active Momotombo volcano spitting out a cloud of toxic gas and steam just a few years after its latest eruption.
An infamous Nicaraguan volcano coughs up toxic clouds of gas a few years after its first eruptions for more than a century. Momotombo is an active stratovolcano that sits on the northern shore of Lake Managua in west Nicaragua. Stereographers who surveyed the region dubbed the volcano “the smoking terror” in 1902, according to NASA’s Earth Observatory. It is relatively young for a volcano — around 4,500 years old — and its peak is 4,167 feet (1,270 meters) It is mentioned in the Smithsonian Institution’s Global Volcanism Program. Web site.
July 16, 1990, the Philippine volcano Mount Pinatubo was the world’s largest volcanic eruption to happen in the past 100 years In New England the sky was a light red color lasting many hays, was beautiful. Many thousand tons of noxious sulfur dioxide gas were also emitted by the volcano. I remember in NH / VT the sky was a light red, lasting a few days, beautiful. Winds carry the gasses around the planet.
How many cows would it take to have a comparison?
in just a few days and with how many vehicles equilalent? I haven’t heard a peep from the news media or any Government official—Congress or otherwise.
The rhetoric is like chicken little running around in circles “The sky is Falling, is Falling”. Another Flat Earth prophecy. As the saying goes, “Figures don’t lie, Lairs can figure” and “If you can’t Dazzle them with Brilliance, Baffle them with BS”. Regarding this article.
Exactly!!
I find it interesting that we find ourselves here, arguing about cows vs cars or some other extremely minor or even insignificant detail, while we all continue to ignore the elephant in the room.
The elephant you say? What’s that?
Let’s start with windmills. They chew up natural resources and rare earth metals to make. They’re installed by specialized heavy machinery that. ironically, uses more energy from being built to being used in actual construction than the windmills could ever hope to provide. On land, we flatten mountaintops, remove trees, build specialized roads to haul everything up there and that can handle all the specialized, heavy equipment. Then those roads must be maintained, because windmills must be maintained. Yet when we have a storm that would have, in the past, caused what we called runoff, we instead get a flash flood, wiping out that road as well as some number of unlucky homeowners or farmers who live in the valley below.
In the ocean, windmills have been proven to decimate fisheries that have been productive for hundreds of years. The subsonic vibrations drive the fish away and cause whales to beach themselves. From the noise? From messing with their inner navigation systems? Who knows? Who cares? The effects are there for all to see. Let’s see… how do you maintain an ocean windmill? Ummm… big boats powered by big stinky diesel generators? Boats that must be capable of carrying the same energy inefficient heavy equipment as above? Never mind what a hurricane or real northeaster will do to a windmill. 100+ MPH winds and 80 foot seas will destroy anything in their path.
Wherever you put them, what is a windmill’s lifespan? Fifteen years? Less? And they aren’t even capable of producing 1/10 of 1% of the power we need now, never mind after adding millions of EVs to the grid.
Yeah, they’re gonna look pretty sad all toppled over in the ocean or on our mountaintops in 20 years. What an eyesore that will be. You think anyone will remove them? Hahahahahaha! Where’s the money in that?
Let’s move on to ski resorts. Are they REALLY necessary? Do we really need ALL those trails? ALL those high-speed lifts? ALL those condos, bars, and restaurants? All so affluent people can get hauled up a hill in perfect comfort, slide down, and tell all their friends how “exhilarating” it was? And of course, the same arguments apply as above. The energy cost of construction and maintenance is ridiculous. Runoffs become flash floods, which then become *Climate Change*! Maybe if the mountaintops hadn’t been cleared and all those trees cut down for trails and condos, maybe those flash floods might not occur with such frequency?
Look around you. Where gets destroyed regularly by heavy rains? To me anyway, Ludlow comes to mind as a good example. How many times have the town and Route 103 had to be rebuilt recently? At a cost of what? Never mind the dollars, just look at the energy usage required. Maybe that wouldn’t happen if Okemo were still a forested mountain? Or maybe once every 100 years instead of once every 5?
Let’s not forget, back in the 1930s, skiers *walked* up mountains and skied down between the trees on natural snow. And they got in several runs (and climbs) per day! Now to me, THAT’S a physical accomplishment to be proud of and brag about.
But what do I know…
Just to add additional criticism to windmills. They were reported to be bird killers. In high winds they are shut down and useless, so stupid. Why not incorporate centrifugal clutches to vary the pitch of the blades to have a max safe speed and produce. Many planes have variable pitch props. At take off, max the pitch. When cruising vary the pitch for cruising speeds and not stress the engine.. I’m a pilot.
Most or all windmills are political darlings. The most stupid people in a state are in government, they don’t have a clue about anything, yet legislate based on what lobbyists spew. Windmills transformed a beautiful ridge / mountain top to one of hideous clutter. Windmills catch fire. Windmills ruin mountains, solar displays ruin fields and for what so a ;politician can sleep at night thinking they accomplished something? I have seen miles of windmills in the western states, 30 to 50 miles of them row after row. The Fort Stockton Plateau west of San Antonia I-10 in Texas, more in Nebraska, South Dakota, Iowa and more. More so impressive there than in crazy winds in Vermont. The windmills in those states are more accessible, flat land. If I see windmills atop of MT. Mansfield and Mt Washington (NH) I know it’s all gone to hell.
In my travels, about once a year to western states, I don’t see much solar farms as in VT. Money is involved. Some places are removing them as being inefficient. There are far better and more efficient ways to produce electricity, legislators have no clue.
This period of time seems to be a threshold of evolution. I project all these elec methods will be stripped out as technology evolves. Many methods are known, take neuclear fusion for example. Better designs of Nuclear Plants have been designed. But have to overcome the absolute idiocy of liberals that think a Nuke plant is the Atomic bomb. Ref, the protesting of Vermont Yankee, done in and increase in elec costs. They also have Three Mile Island wrapped in their minds. Those Libs won’t pay anyone’s elec bill based on their crapology. I knew a person that worked in TMI removing the waste and a brother who trucked it off to be disposed. They didn’t die.
I could go on—-WTH
And what about hydro? There’s no cleaner, more renewable, more accessible energy source in New England, and maybe none cheaper. Yet we conveniently ignore what’s worked for years.