Bjorn, not only are these emissions overstated, they should not even be considered "anthropogenic emissions". The whole approach is absurd from head to tail. In terms of CO2 emissions, considering a grazing system we have obvious negative CO2 emissions (there is sequestration of CO2 in the grass, carbon stocks in pasture land are higher than in agriculture land, and have yearly continuous sequestration, and then there is a significant sequestration in undecomposed manure, and of course the cow itself). Life cycle analysis of the entire system show that for grazing systems actually there is a sequestration of up to 6kg per kg of beef for natural grazing systems).



Now some would argue: the problem is the GWP of methane and nitrous oxide! Really? I think the problem is the IPCC GHG protocol methodology. Why doesn't it take into account sequestration balance? Why only enteric fermentation and emissions from manure? One is tempted to think that it is because the balance would be unimportant, but it actually is not at all, to the point that when you consider the whole system you get systems where sequestration is up to over 6kg of CO2 equivalent per kg of beef meat! Check this article as an example: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308521X17310338



Why does LCA or IPCC protocol also FAIL miserably to identify, when it comes to emissions, which emissions come from fossil fuel sources and which ones from natural sources? CO2 from natural sources at some point in the short past was in the atmosphere so one way or the other will come back to it (even methane, afer 10 years converted into CO2)... so why muddle the whole debate with CO2 that comes from natural sources such as grass and leaves? Shouldn't we focus our energy on tackling fossil fuels only, which will take hundreds or thousands of years to reduce?



Not to talk about a well known fact: methane emissions from wild animals prior to the human led mega extinction in the neolithic were higher than current total emissions from livestock and wild animals... so we are just going back to the pre-human normal!



In my humble opinion, the whole issue has been muddled by the vegan movement, and its interest in demonizing "industrial" livestock production. Time to stop this nonsense at once.