Live data from Hacker News

Seaweed in Cow Feed Reduces Methane Emissions Almost Entirely

foodtank.com

21–30 of 282 posts

Re: Seaweed in Cow Feed Reduces Methane Emissions Almost Entirely

#21
post #16

How is that the article’s title and did any of the comments on seaweed read the article? It was the experiment with red algae, not the seaweed experiments that “reduces methane emissions almost entirely”. > Kinley and De Nys tested 20 different species of seaweed on bacteria found in the stomachs of cows. They discovered seaweed reduced methane production by up to 50 percent, depending on the amount administered. But…

[deleted]

Re: Seaweed in Cow Feed Reduces Methane Emissions Almost Entirely

#22
post #7

What's the best way to investment exposure to agricultural seaweed?

Most of the largest seaweed producers are unlisted in terms of public stock exchanges, such as Dalian Kowa Foods which is China's largest producer, or Seaweed Harvest Holland in Europe.

You could always start your own backyard seaweed production business:

"Meet the new US entrepreneurs farming seaweed for food and fuel"

https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jun/29...

Re: Seaweed in Cow Feed Reduces Methane Emissions Almost Entirely

#23
post #14

Can this study be done with the cow feed just being plain old grass? There’s lots of anecdotal evidence showing grass fed cows don’t produce much methane, thereby making pasture raised meat environmentally friendly. Yet there doesn’t appear to be many studies on it for whatever reason. Everything is focused on corn-based cow feed.

I believe grass fed cattle produce more methane actually.

Re: Seaweed in Cow Feed Reduces Methane Emissions Almost Entirely

#24
post #6

I recently heard about Russian cosmonauts eating a lot of dill to counteract farting. It's apparently called a carminative, and seaweed is a carminative too.

Maybe that's why cabbage and cheese pies are made with dill in Russia and Eastern Europe.

Re: Seaweed in Cow Feed Reduces Methane Emissions Almost Entirely

#25

Few stories make me as happy as this one did. Thank you OP. Hopefully in the future I can enjoy a beef-steak guilt-free! The cow methane problem is one that literally keeps me up at night. I kept thinking about my inevitable switch to chicken and missing out on a tenderloin.. and how my kids won't be able to eat like me.

I feel ya and it would make my feel a little better about my meat treats, but improving that end (pun) of the equation seems to be a smaller problem than the energy required.

> The findings, while expected, are quite sobering. Pork, chicken, dairy and eggs are equivalent within a factor of two when it came to their environmental burdens, the authors determined. But beef requires far, far more resources than any of those other protein categories. The team calculated that beef requires 28 times more land, six times more fertilizer and 11 times more water compared to those other food sources. That adds up to about five times more greenhouse gas emissions.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/beef-uses-ten-...

Re: Seaweed in Cow Feed Reduces Methane Emissions Almost Entirely

#26

Few stories make me as happy as this one did. Thank you OP. Hopefully in the future I can enjoy a beef-steak guilt-free! The cow methane problem is one that literally keeps me up at night. I kept thinking about my inevitable switch to chicken and missing out on a tenderloin.. and how my kids won't be able to eat like me.

[deleted]

Re: Seaweed in Cow Feed Reduces Methane Emissions Almost Entirely

#27
post #16

How is that the article’s title and did any of the comments on seaweed read the article? It was the experiment with red algae, not the seaweed experiments that “reduces methane emissions almost entirely”. > Kinley and De Nys tested 20 different species of seaweed on bacteria found in the stomachs of cows. They discovered seaweed reduced methane production by up to 50 percent, depending on the amount administered. But…

Seaweed is a colloquial term for macroalgae. Asparagopsis taxiformis is a red macroalgae.

Re: Seaweed in Cow Feed Reduces Methane Emissions Almost Entirely

#28
How does a discovery like this take place? There must be so many crazy facts like this that have not yet been discovered, and able to make the world a better place. I'm guessing it started out as a hunch and snowballed into a study. Is there a way we can speed up the world's crazy thought ecosystem to promote sharing information that will lead to more discoveries like this?

Re: Seaweed in Cow Feed Reduces Methane Emissions Almost Entirely

#29
post #20
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I need more dill in my life! After weight lots surgery, any carbohydrates give me the most painful gas.

>I need more dill in my life! Yeah, sure, _until you don't_. Bear in mind that it's essentially an invasive weed if you have a backyard garden. Be careful if you attempt to grow it at home, it might take over.

Eastern swallow tails will take care of almost any dill problem you have. They'll do a number of fennel too, if it is there. Things I've learned hacking in the garden.

Re: Seaweed in Cow Feed Reduces Methane Emissions Almost Entirely

#30

Few stories make me as happy as this one did. Thank you OP. Hopefully in the future I can enjoy a beef-steak guilt-free! The cow methane problem is one that literally keeps me up at night. I kept thinking about my inevitable switch to chicken and missing out on a tenderloin.. and how my kids won't be able to eat like me.

People are also trying to make meat without animals, by culturing animal tissues outside of an animal. You can see on a number of previous HN threads on this topic that a lot of animal advocacy groups have been forming a consensus about supporting these. I don't think any limits have been established on their eventual "realism" or biological similarity to tissues grown inside an animal.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultured_meat for a lot of interesting ideas and references.

Post reply on HN