How dairy farmers are cashing in on California's push for cleaner fuel

How dairy farmers are cashing in on California's push for cleaner fuel

Transcript¹

California is trying to cut greenhouse emissions³ from the state's cars and trucks, and in a controversial twist, its efforts are putting cash in the pockets of dairy farms across the country. It's the result of an odd but lucrative⁴ trade: pollution cuts on farms, in order to satisfy limits on emissions from California's roadways.

Among those that could reap a windfall is High Plains Ponderosa Dairy, in southwest Kansas. The dairy's thousands of cows spend their days and nights inside long barns. "They've got fans and cooling in the summertime, and they're warmer in the wintertime, but because of that, when your cows poop, it goes on the concrete, and we can collect it all," says Greg Bethard, the dairy's general manager.

Right now, that manure⁵ goes into big storage ponds called lagoons⁶ where bacteria feed on it and release a gas called methane⁷. Methane is the main ingredient in natural gas, burned in home furnaces and stoves. It's also a powerful greenhouse gas. It doesn't persist in the atmosphere as long as carbon dioxide, but while it does, it traps 80 times more heat, helping⁸ to drive climate change.

Later this year, though, the dairy's manure will instead flow into big tanks, called anaerobic⁹ digesters, that will capture most of the methane.

The captured methane will go into a natural gas pipeline¹⁰ that's located just a few miles from the farm. That pipeline is connected to gas pipelines¹¹ in California, which is essential for it to participate in California's emission²-trading system.

California's Low Carbon Fuel Standard sets increasingly strict limits on greenhouse gas emissions from transportation fuels used by California's cars and trucks. Oil and gas companies, which sell gasoline and diesel¹² fuel, have to satisfy these caps on emissions. They can satisfy the law by selling less gasoline, but there's also another option; they can pay for cuts in greenhouse emissions somewhere else.

This is where the methane-capturing equipment at Ponderosa High Plains Dairy comes in. The dairy is building it through a partnership¹³ with the oil company Shell. When they capture methane from manure, they'll be awarded pollution-reduction credits – partly for reducing their methane emissions, and partly for delivering a less-polluting fuel for use in California's transportation fleet.

California's oil and gas companies can buy those credits to cancel out their own emissions. The dairy also will earn clean fuel credits through a separate federal program called the renewable fuel standard.

For High Plains Dairy and Shell, these emissions credits could be worth tens of millions of dollars a year, although the value of those credits does go up and down, depending on demand. "If you take today's value [of the credits] and extrapolate it out, yes, there's profits to be made," Bethard says. "But I still think, long term, our primary business is still going to be milk."

Because its manure ponds release lots of methane, Bethard's dairy is set up perfectly¹⁴ to take advantage of this opportunity. There's more pollution to eliminate, which means more profits to be gained by doing so. Dairies or beef cattle operations that keep cows outside, allowing their manure to dry, or those that allow cows to graze on pasture, don't generate as much methane from manure.

Aaron Smith, an economist¹⁵ at the University of California, Davis, decided¹⁶ to examine the impact of emission credits on such dairy farms. "I had heard people saying this was kind of a big deal, and I sort of put off looking into it for a while, because I was thinking, 'How big of a deal could it really be?'" he says.

When he calculated the potential revenue from emissions credits, "I was stunned," he says.

The value of these pollution-cutting credits could amount to a 50% boost in revenue over just selling the cows' milk. Smith published the result as a blog post titled "What's more valuable: A cow's milk or its poop?" It quickly became the second-most read article on his website, only trailing a taste-test of fast-food chicken sandwiches that Smith and his daughter carried out.

Smith says that the generous subsidies¹⁷ for dairy-derived methane might lead to a paradoxical and unwelcome result. It could persuade dairies to expand, adding more cows, and producing more manure. This is particularly worrisome because cows also release methane by burping it out as they digest grass, and those emissions can't be captured.

This isn't what California's emission-trading system intended. "If you have a program that creates incentives¹⁸ to generate more pollution, then you're not going to get the benefits that you want," Smith says.

Smith says he's not sure that these credits are, in fact, persuading dairies to expand. But considering the potential revenue, he says, it certainly could happen.

A coalition¹⁹ of environmental justice groups is now mobilizing to stop it. Brent Newell, an attorney with one of those groups — Public Justice — wrote a petition to the California Air Resources Board (CARB) demanding that it stop issuing credits to dairy or beef or hog²⁰ farms for capturing methane. "The solution is not to commodify it, so that cows and hogs²¹ are pooping money!" he says.

Newell says these credits mainly benefit the biggest farms, which are the biggest polluters, "and it harms the health and welfare of communities that experience all the air and water pollution that's associated with the factory farm system."

According to Michael McCully, a consultant²² to the dairy industry, farms need at least 3000 cows to produce enough manure to justify²³ building an anaerobic digester. In a 2021 article published in Hoard's Dairyman, McCulley wrote that the emissions-trading programs could make it harder for small dairy farms to survive, since they have difficulty taking advantage of this new revenue stream..

Last week, California's environmental regulators denied Newell's petition. Richard Corey, CARB's executive director, wrote that the current emissions trading system is working as designed, encouraging farmers to capture methane emissions. In fact, data from another climate-related program in California show that money invested in manure digesters had the greatest impact on greenhouse emissions, at the least cost. However, Corey also said that CARB will take a fresh look at these criticisms and decide whether the program needs tweaking.

Oregon and Washington, meanwhile, are moving toward launching their own emissions-trading systems, which could further boost demand for manure-derived methane.

1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 emission   

n.发出物，散发物；发出，散发

参考例句：

• Rigorous measures will be taken to reduce the total pollutant emission.采取严格有力措施，降低污染物排放总量。
• Finally,the way to effectively control particulate emission is pointed out.最后，指出有效降低颗粒排放的方向。

3 emissions   

排放物( emission的名词复数 )； 散发物（尤指气体）

参考例句：

• Most scientists accept that climate change is linked to carbon emissions. 大多数科学家都相信气候变化与排放的含碳气体有关。
• Dangerous emissions radiate from plutonium. 危险的辐射物从钚放散出来。

4 lucrative   

adj.赚钱的，可获利的

参考例句：

• He decided to turn his hobby into a lucrative sideline.他决定把自己的爱好变成赚钱的副业。
• It was not a lucrative profession.那是一个没有多少油水的职业。

5 manure   

n.粪，肥，肥粒；vt.施肥

参考例句：

• The farmers were distributing manure over the field.农民们正在田间施肥。
• The farmers used manure to keep up the fertility of their land.农夫们用粪保持其土质的肥沃。

6 lagoons   

n.污水池( lagoon的名词复数 )；潟湖；（大湖或江河附近的）小而浅的淡水湖；温泉形成的池塘

参考例句：

• The Islands are by shallow crystal clear lagoons enclosed by coral reefs. 该群岛包围由珊瑚礁封闭的浅水清澈泻湖。 来自互联网
• It is deposited in low-energy environments in lakes, estuaries and lagoons. 它沉淀于湖泊、河口和礁湖的低能量环境中，也可于沉淀于深海环境。 来自互联网

7 methane   

n.甲烷，沼气

参考例句：

• The blast was caused by pockets of methane gas that ignited.爆炸是由数袋甲烷气体着火引起的。
• Methane may have extraterrestrial significance.甲烷具有星际意义。

8 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

9 anaerobic   

adj.厌氧的

参考例句：

• Anaerobic respiration occurs only in particularly active tissues such as muscles during severe exercise. 厌氧呼吸只有在处于剧烈运动状态的肌肉等特别活跃的组织中才会发生。
• Infection,especially anaerobic infection, is much more apt to occur.感染，特别是厌氧感染很容易发生。

10 pipeline   

n.管道，管线

参考例句：

• The pipeline supplies Jordan with 15 per cent of its crude oil.该管道供给约旦15%的原油。
• A single pipeline serves all the houses with water.一条单管路给所有的房子供水。

11 pipelines   

管道( pipeline的名词复数 )； 输油管道； 在考虑（或规划、准备） 中； 在酿中

参考例句：

• The oil is carried to the oil refinery by pipelines. 石油通过输油管输送到炼油厂。
• The oil carried in pipelines. 石油用管道输送。

12 diesel   

n.柴油发动机，内燃机

参考例句：

• We experimented with diesel engines to drive the pumps.我们试着用柴油机来带动水泵。
• My tractor operates on diesel oil.我的那台拖拉机用柴油开动。

13 partnership   

n.合作关系，伙伴关系

参考例句：

• The company has gone into partnership with Swiss Bank Corporation.这家公司已经和瑞士银行公司建立合作关系。
• Martin has taken him into general partnership in his company.马丁已让他成为公司的普通合伙人。

14 perfectly   

adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The witnesses were each perfectly certain of what they said.证人们个个对自己所说的话十分肯定。
• Everything that we're doing is all perfectly above board.我们做的每件事情都是光明正大的。

15 economist   

n.经济学家，经济专家，节俭的人

参考例句：

• He cast a professional economist's eyes on the problem.他以经济学行家的眼光审视这个问题。
• He's an economist who thinks he knows all the answers.他是个经济学家，自以为什么都懂。

16 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

17 subsidies   

n.补贴，津贴，补助金( subsidy的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• European agriculture ministers failed to break the deadlock over farm subsidies. 欧洲各国农业部长在农业补贴问题上未能打破僵局。
• Agricultural subsidies absorb about half the EU's income. 农业补贴占去了欧盟收入的大约一半。 来自《简明英汉词典》

18 incentives   

激励某人做某事的事物( incentive的名词复数 )； 刺激； 诱因； 动机

参考例句：

• tax incentives to encourage savings 鼓励储蓄的税收措施
• Furthermore, subsidies provide incentives only for investments in equipment. 更有甚者，提供津贴仅是为鼓励增添设备的投资。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法

19 coalition   

n.结合体，同盟，结合，联合

参考例句：

• The several parties formed a coalition.这几个政党组成了政治联盟。
• Coalition forces take great care to avoid civilian casualties.联盟军队竭尽全力避免造成平民伤亡。

20 hog   

n.猪；馋嘴贪吃的人；vt.把…占为己有，独占

参考例句：

• He is greedy like a hog.他像猪一样贪婪。
• Drivers who hog the road leave no room for other cars.那些占着路面的驾驶员一点余地都不留给其他车辆。

21 hogs   

n.（尤指喂肥供食用的）猪( hog的名词复数 )；（供食用的）阉公猪；彻底地做某事；自私的或贪婪的人

参考例句：

• 'sounds like -- like hogs grunting. “像——像是猪发出的声音。 来自英汉文学 - 汤姆历险
• I hate the way he hogs down his food. 我讨厌他那副狼吞虎咽的吃相。 来自辞典例句

22 consultant   

n.顾问；会诊医师，专科医生

参考例句：

• He is a consultant on law affairs to the mayor.他是市长的一个法律顾问。
• Originally,Gar had agreed to come up as a consultant.原来，加尔只答应来充当我们的顾问。

23 justify   

vt.证明…正当(或有理)，为…辩护

参考例句：

• He tried to justify his absence with lame excuses.他想用站不住脚的借口为自己的缺席辩解。
• Can you justify your rude behavior to me?你能向我证明你的粗野行为是有道理的吗？