How Much Methane Does A Cow Produce In An Hour?

The 2009 Royal Institution Christmas Lectures, Prof Sue Hartley will show you plants and their relationship with animals as you've never seen them before!

In this clip we explore how much methane a cow can produce in one hour- needless to say the results are pretty explosive...

Make sure you're tuned into More4 between the 21st and 25th December to watch the lectures or go to the Christmas Lecture website http://www.rigb.org/contentControl?action=displayContent&id=00000003536 to find our more!

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• cow
• methane
• christmas lecture
• explosion
• gas
• fart
• christmas
• christmas lectures
• sue hartley
• The RI
• RI
• Royal Institution

[TheRoyalInstitution]

The video was originally shown in the 2009 RI Christmas Lecture (a science event for young people) about plants, and how they have successfully defended themselves against animals for 300 million years. Some animals, like the cow, have evolved complex digestive systems that then in turn overcome these defences. The explosion illustrates the amount of food energy wasted even by so complex a digestive system as a cow’s.

Hopefully this additional context will help!

[toechesse]

I refer you to methane bubbles produced by the earth in the arctic.

[touchmemove]

information?? how stupid this video is T_T not making any sense

[ytfarmer90]

i don't see what purpose this video is serving, except for a cool explosion. what information is a person supposed to take away from this?

[robzoneutube]

methane is a very unstable gas as is shown by the video. Borken down by any source of ignition, uv or IR radiation. Unlike CO2 which cannot be burnt or altered except painstakingly by plants.methane is not a persistent gas like carbon dioxide, so a direct comparison using only the infra red absorbance is invalid. There is no proof that there are more ruminants now than 10 000 years ago. Nearly all the bison(ruminants) in America were killed. The globe did not cool as a result.

[hapolian]

What's the answer? Numbers?