Dutch firm’s methane slasher hits NZ roadblock

A Dutch company trying to get its methane-slashing innovation into the hands of Kiwi farmers says it’s hit a roadblock with NZ regulations.

Methane emissions from livestock like sheep and dairy cows account for around a third of New Zealand’s emissions.

The animals themselves did not produce methane, but rather a group of microbes, called methanogens, that lived in the stomach (rumen), and produced methane when digesting feed.

Scientists here and around the world have been pushing toward a solution, and one promising feed supplement, 3-NOP, has already been found to cut methane in overseas barn-fed systems by up to 30 per cent.

The Netherlands-headquartered multinational behind it, DSM, has carried out small highly controlled experiments with 3-NOP in New Zealand’s pasture-based farms, and DairyNZ is now planning farm-scale tests.

The technology, which worked by stopping bacteria in a cow’s rumen from converting hydrogen into methane, was expected to soon be available to European farms.

But DSM’s global boss Christoph Goppelsroeder said his company was facing a regulatory hurdle in bringing 3-NOP to market here.

Europe’s framework had been designed to accommodate technology that improved environmental outcomes, but there was no such “slot” here, Goppelsroeder told the Herald during a visit to New Zealand last week. “We’ve had a little bit of a roadblock here with registration — we cannot even file, because there is no category for it.”

Goppelsroeder, whose visit included meetings with Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor, Climate Change Minister James Shaw and top industry figures, felt there was an urgent case for the Government to resolve the issue.

A spokesperson for Shaw’s office said officials had been asked to investigate options and provide advice — but added that both ministers had made it clear that these sorts of products needed to meet a “robust regulatory process”.

Mark Aspin, general manager of New Zealand’s collaborative Pastoral Greenhouse Gas Research Consortium, said 3-NOP appeared to be an effective inhibitor, and any step forward was a good one.

But how it could be applied to New Zealand’s farms — and whether it could achieve the same results — was another question.