War on Flatulence? Obama to Regulate Cow Emissions for Climate Plan

 by: The Blog
The Obama Administration wants to reduce methane emissions by cracking down on cows’ digestive processes.
In a White House fact sheet published March 28, the federal government is looking to adopt “cost-effective technology” to reduce dairy sector greenhouse gas emissions by a quarter within the next six years. Purchasing methane digestion technology for U.S. dairy, the document says,  is a part of the Administration’s plan to “protect our kids’ health and begin to slow the effects of climate change.”
This goes hand-in-hand with the EPA’s report that says “beef and dairy cows [are] by far the largest emitters” of methane gas.
“During digestion, microbes resident in an animal’s digestive system ferment food consumed by the animal,” says the EPA. “This microbial fermentation process, referred to as enteric fermentation, produces [methane] as a byproduct, which can be exhaled or eructated by the animal.”
While cows may be the “largest emitters” of methane, there is less methane in the atmosphere today than in the early 1990s due to market incentives for energy producers to capture and sell the gas. An article at the Daily Caller says that methane gas has dropped 11 percent over the last two decades and that the EPAs methane leakage estimates are 50 times higher than the estimates made by oil and gas companies.
Responding to a new United Nations report on climate change, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said denying climate science is “malpractice” and that ignoring it will have “catastrophic” costs.