Portugese study on the intensity of milk production on GHG emissions.

Recently a paper has been published with the aim to evaluate the relationship between the intensity of milk production for a wide range of Portuguese commercial cattle farms and NH₃ and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from manure management and enteric fermentation.

The manure management and enteric fermentation in a typical Portuguese cattle farm contributes with 7.5±0.15 g N/L milk produced as NH₃ and 1.2±0.22 kg CO₂ equivalent per litre of milk as GHG. Increasing milk production will significantly reduce NH₃ and GHG emissions per litre of milk produced. It can be concluded that a win-win strategy for reducing NH₃ and GHG emissions from dairy cattle farms will be the increase of milk production on these farms. This goal can be achieved by implementing animal breeding programs and improving feed efficiency in order to increase productivity.

The full paper can be read at: http://dx.doi.org/10.5424/sjar/2015134-8176