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Cattle industry has a beef with EPA over greenhouse gases

AutoblogGreen

Published 2009-12-31 01:12:00

Filed under: Etc., Green Culture, Legislation and Policy, Green Daily, USA

To the surprise of many, the vast majority of the automakers that sell their wares here in the United States welcomed the EPA's decision earlier in the year that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are damaging to the environment and should therefore be regulated. That has plenty to do with the desire for a single national fuel mileage standard. But transportation certainly isn't the only way we generate greenhouse gases as a society.

The first group to publicly challenge the EPA's proposed finding is the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, which filed an official challenge to the ruling on December 24th. The group questions whether there's sufficient scientific evidence that greenhouse gases are a significant cause of climate change.

Why, you ask, does the National Cattlemen's Beef Association care about the EPA's opinion of greenhouse gases? That'd be all the methane gas emitted by their cattle. Though we tend to focus on carbon dioxide, methane is actually more dangerous and is thought to contribute more to trapping heat in the atmosphere than most other greenhouse gases.

While it's relatively easy to regulate the kinds of vehicles Americans are allowed to drive, we'd guess it would be much more difficult to write laws directing people what kinds of cattle they can raise and, in turn, what kinds of food they can eat. We'll be interested to see how this issue plays out.

[Source: Green Car Advisor | Photo: Clinton Steeds - C.C. 2.0]

Cattle industry has a beef with EPA over greenhouse gases originally appeared on Autoblog Green on Thu, 31 Dec 2009 08:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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