Can a controversial harmone used in milk production fight global warming?
Could a controversial hormone help shrink carbon 'hoofprint'?
Amid all the talk about climate change, the meat and dairy industries have come under scrutiny for their production of methane, one of the most troublesome of all the greenhouse gases. But in the "damned if you do, damned if you don't" department, the Web site Science Daily this week has publicized a study that finds a controversial hormone used by many dairy farmers to increase milk production may have a green side as well.
Cornell University researchers say that injecting dairy cattle with the growth hormone recombinant Bovine Somatotropin (rbST) increases the cows' milk production by 15 percent, thereby reducing the farms' carbon "hoofprint." The Science Daily story continues:
In 2007, there were 9.2 million cows in the United States. For every 1 million cows supplemented with rbST, the world would see an environmental saving of 824 million kilograms of carbon dioxide, 41 million kilograms of methane and 96,000 kilograms of nitrous oxide. For every 1 million cows supplemented with rbST, the reduction in the carbon footprint is equivalent to removing approximately 400,000 family cars from the road or planting 300 million trees.
If "rbST" or its synonym "rbGH"rings a bell, it's not surprising. Some say the artificial growth hormone poses a health threat to humans, possibly causing a higher incidence of breast, colon and prostate cancer. Canada, Europe, Australia and Japan have banned the use of the hormone, and some American companies such as the ice-cream maker Ben & Jerry's have stopped buying milk from cows treated with rbST.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has said since 1993 that rbST is safe for human consumption, though that decision has been criticized as being tilted in favor of the drug giant that makes the hormone, Monsanto.
There also is some skepticism whirling around the study itself, Scientific American reported this week. Some of the researchers have close ties to Monsanto, and the lead scientist, nutritional biochemist Dale Bauman of Cornell, "has been a paid consultant for Monsanto since the 1980s, though he declined to disclose how much the company has paid him over the years," SciAm reported.
One might think the Cornell study would be warmly received in New Mexico, which is in the vanguard of states tackling global warming and where dairy farming is the largest agricultural industry. The conclusions might not have the desired effect, however.
Because the hormone is certified by the FDA, it's a farmer's individual decision to use it or not, said G.H. Cain, a spokesman for New Mexico members of the Dairy Farmers of America. "The overwhelming majority of them do not," he said. "Most didn't use it before" the hormone became a consumer issue, Cain added, "and they don't use it now, because they just didn't think it paid off in their particular operations."
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