Journal article
A whole farm systems analysis of greenhouse gas emissions of 60 Tasmanian dairy farms
KM Christie, RP Rawnsley, RJ Eckard
Animal Feed Science and Technology | Published : 2011
Abstract
The Australian dairy industry contributes ∼1.6% of the nation's greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, emitting an estimated 8.9 million tonnes of CO2 equivalents (tCO2e)/annum (DCC, 2008). This study examined GHG emissions of 60 Tasmanian dairy farms using the Dairy Greenhouse gas Abatement Strategies (DGAS) calculator, which incorporates International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Australian inventory methodologies, algorithms and emission factors. Sources of GHG emissions including pre-farm embedded emissions associated with key farm inputs (i.e., grains/concentrates, forages and fertilizers) and on-farm emissions from CO2, CH4 and N2O are estimated by DGAS software. A detailed description ..
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Funding Acknowledgements
This project was supported by funding from Meat and Livestock Australia, Dairy Australia, Australia Wool Innovation, the Tasmanian Institute of Agricultural Research and the Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry under its Australia's Farming Future Climate Change Research Program. The authors thank Dairy Australia for providing data for the 60 dairy farms and the contribution to farm data collation by the Dairy Business Centre and TIAR. The DGAS calculator is freely available and can be downloaded at www.dairyingfortomorrow.com.au/index.php?id=47.