The Greener Cattle Initiative (GCI), a multi-partner international consortium investing in research mitigating enteric methane, awarded additional grants to reduce enteric methane emissions from cattle. The grants aim to understand how mitigating methane emissions impacts cows’ biology, performance and health and if selective breeding can result in cows that produce less enteric methane.
Dr. Francisco Peñagaricano, assistant professor in the Animal and Dairy Sciences Department at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, received $2,301,499 from the GCI to conduct research combining interventions that address selective breeding, data on milk composition, and rumen microbes to reduce enteric methane emissions. His research focuses on evaluating cattle genome for methane traits, including those for methane production and residual methane production. The goal of his research is to be able use this new knowledge to inform the selective breeding of U.S. dairy cattle with lower emissions. The Council on Dairy Cattle Breeding (CDCB) is contributing additional funding for a total $3,301,496 investment.