The Lieberman-Warner legislation has seen numerous versions with the latest (pushed by Senator Barbara Boxer) being less friendly to agriculture. The overall objective of the bill is to establish a cap-and-trade system on three key sectors which emit the most greenhouse gases. Agriculture would not be a regulated entity. Carbon-emissions from upstream transportation (oil), utilities, and manufacturing companies would have to reduce emissions or pay for credits that allow them. GHG emissions from these industries are capped at levels below their historic baseline. These industries can trade in the marketplace for GHG emission “credits.”
Under a cap-and-trade system, dairy is uniquely positioned to benefit as a credit supplier to these capped entities. Methane capture and destruction would be positioned as an immediate mitigation, therefore highly valuable to those purchasing credits.
Dairy farms can capture or destroy methane emissions through use of anaerobic digesters or simply cover a lagoon and flare the methane. Both of these practices would provide measurable, permanent, and continuous reductions of GHG emissions. In addition, proper grazing management practices as well as no-till and other soil management practices could generate additional sale of credits at estimated price ranges of $2 to $20 an acre, although these estimates can not be verified at this time.
Update - Early summer 2008
During the Senate debate, Sen. Barbara Boxer made changes to the bill, so it is now known as the Lieberman-Warner-Boxer legislation. The bill failed to generate enough votes for cloture to allow the Senate to actually vote on it. Changes must be made to the legislation before it can go back to the Senate floor again.
