narrator: on this episode of "earth focus," climate change is forcing traditional dairy producers to look for more sustainable methods. in central california, farmers have found wayays to reduce and evenen reue methane gas, while in eastern africa, drought is creating a market for an unexpected source of milk.

different announcer: "earth focus" is made possible in part by a grant from anne ray foundation, a margaret a. cargill philanthropy; the orange county c community foundation; and the farvue foundndation. man: so this is a tradition here. we put cups in the freezer, best way to drink milk. [cows mooing] one thing i've learned about cows here, of which about 2,500 are milking and then you have a dry period, in a perfect world, 660 days. [cows mooing] she has a calf, and then she produces milk again for another year. [whistles] lot of our milk gets made into butter. and then some of our milk also goes to making mozzarelella cheese. there's a

good chancnce you're tastingng e oof our milklk every day. [engine starts] he likes--he likes driving papa around. i'm just--i'm teaching him for later when i'll actually need a driver. you're gonna go out the same way. go slow. you know, a few years ago, california adopted a regulation that really foforced our industy toto start looking a at ways to mitigate the e methane that coms off or out of the cow. you u ner want to get more regegulations thrown on top of you. they're extreremely hard to deal wiwithd sometimes you can't deal with them. everybody's kind ofof grapplpling. cows s make manurue every day and very consistently do. cow eats, you know, dry matter-wise, we'e're around 50 o

660 pounds a day. so, , you kno, all that goes in one end, makes a little bitit of milk, and d at of f it comes o out. i probobaby mamaybe undererestimated w whate potential is for methane going into the environment. you know, we could easily ignore stuff like this, but we're a generational family. we live on our farms. we want to take care of the water, we want to take care of the air 'cause we're trying to do s something that is gonna be positive for my facility, for our industry, and for the environment. having said that, we have to stay economically viable or i'm not in business. reportter: governor jererry bron today signed a bill regulating ememissions from dairy c cows ad landndfills to fight climamate change beyond carbon-based

greenhouse gases. . now, the bil mandates a 40% reduction in methane and hydrofluoric carbon by 2030. lara: we will reduce methane emissions 40%, reducing g organc waste in landfills and working with our dairy industry to reduce emimissions from cows and manure. man: when manure sits in a deep pond, a naturally-occurring bacteria that work in a cow's stomach, or actually in a cowo's 4 4 stomachs, those same bactera keep eating the left over little bits of sugar and other calories, and they emit biogas, which is a combination of methane and co2. both of those are greenhouse gases. and one cowow tends to haveve about 4 t5 tonons per year of co2o2 equiva. if you want to look at it thatat way, essentially itit's aboutute same greenhnhouse gas fooootpris a vehehicle, as a a car. we are a dairy digester development and operations company. a dairy digester is a piece of e equipment t that processes dairyry manure and extracts methane gasas, which is essentially a

naturally-ococcurring biogas that vents out t of manure. a a digester's jjust a device for capturing that gas so it doesn't vent into the air, but instead can be used usefully. and so if you capture it, you get a twofer. you get to prevent t the gases from escapig into the e environmentnt and you have a usable fufuel. so all w'e done here is s we've taken aa normal-sized manure pond which hasas a whole b bunch of liliqud manurure, we've covereded it uph a flexible membrane so that there's no oxygen. and those little bacteria in there, they think they're still in a cow's stomach. that's why we call it a digester. they eat the remaining calories, they emit methane gas, which rises to the top, that we cacapture, preventing ththe greenhouse gases from escaping into the air, and being able to use that gas as a fuel for other uses now. shyler: we get biogas from nearbrby dairies. most rerecente lalaid in a pipipeline that t wl ccollect biogas s from 11 or moe locacal dairies,s, digestersrs t local dairies. . and ththen we e it as it this produduction facility for r fuel, or in some

cases,s, we turn t that renewawe natutural gas into a fuel direrectly. manunure is impoporo the dairiries. they use ththe nutrient value. these are dairy f farms. theyey really ar. there's a symbiotic relatationship. they grow a a lf their o own food. the nutrienens they get from manure are important for that. so this is a littltle bit likeke making lemoe out t of lemons.s. in my vieie's betetter than that.t. it's s kif like makiking lemonade out of, i ddon't t know, lememon waste. .s pretty c cool. maas: joeyey arioso's a dairiry producer, one of the first families, actually, to put in a dairy facility in this particular area of the county. and so we need the producers to mamake this work. we want t as y hhealthy, ststable produducers around, and joeyey was the first one in this particular area. so we're building out to him and we're building to the neighbors as fast as we can. arioso: we use clean water to flush the calves. and then this

water wiwill go out to our pono. we'll u use it to flush the l ls and the milk cows. and then after we separate, it'll eventually come back into the digester. and then after that, we'll use it to irrigate with. so it's--everything around herere--all the water on t the m is recycled 3 3 to 4 times. maas: when we approach a dairy, we explain to them their options. we come together with design, we oversee construction, and then we operate the facility. lyle and calgren rrenewable f fuels are p partneg this prproject. thehey've g gote lead o of the actutual gas clelp operattions. soo essentiaially,e deliver them the raw gas by working with the dairies, and they process the gas and get it into the pipeline on their plant. shyler: one of the options for using that biogas is to turn it into cngng--compressssed natural gas. maas: so our final end product is natural gas. it's biologically no different than natural gas that flows in the pipes to your house. it can be used for a variety of things, but we're going to use it for,

and what we are using it for, is vehicle fuel. arioso: it''s really simple on the farm. we have a covered lagoon. we capture the gas from ththe cow. thehey dry it just at here, , and then they pushsh ito calgren, and then they do all the extra stuff, cleaning and everything that they need to do to m make it where they cacan rl or reusese the gas s on their on facility. so it t just made e at of sense. maas: the state of california has set a target that they want to reduce greenhouse gas emissions across the state, and it's particularly from the dairy industry. they want a 40% reduction by about the middle of the next decade. and it's a carrot and stick approach. they said to the dairy industry, "if you will voluntarily instalall these facilities and meet that goal, thehen that's great. if yu don'n't, we'll probablbly regule you." and so the dadairy indust, working with our industry and others, have all found a way to make these projects profitable so the farmers can afford to put these in, can generate some revenue by doing it, and hopefully forestall some regulation as well.l. arioso: shohort term, of coursee

you've got to pay for r the initial investment. but fromom r ststandpointnt, we didn't hahavo pput a lot o of capital l out. e main thing i was worried about was making sure that if i do this, the state will recognize that i've mitigated my methane proboblem on my y farm. maas: a a facility like ththis n the daiairy farm runs in thee neneighborhood of a few w millin dollars, depending on the size of the dairy.y. the statete of californiaia had some e funds avavailable ththat have bebeen y benefificial in gegetting morere farmers to invest and reducing that capital cost. arioso: if there is a a positive note toto this regulationon, thy arere willing to hehelp our indy mitigate i it, you know, with se dollars and then, you know, some science that, you know, on technology as we've just put in to help mitigate the problem. it's not just ththe milk now. yu knknow, i keep saying ththe milk becaususe that's--every month wn i sit down to pay my bills, you know, up tillll 3 monthths ago,t was only my milk c check. now, u know, it's the gas. the cow's actuaually gonna create anonothr

form of income, you know, really drdriven by amazing technology. maas:s: the amoununt of revenena didigester canan create fofor ar depends on the finanancial ararrangementsts. but in generat can n produce a a 6-figure i ino the farm.m. so he's genereratinw revevenue without tataking additionanal risk. anand it makt a lot eaeasier when n you go bao the e state and d ask to expxpar dairy y or ask to o change youor operations because you've shown that you're already prorogressie and you''re already ahead of the curve e in implementing envirironmental protections. arioso: you have to makake sure you comply with the newer regulatioions, otherwrwise yourm becomes wororthless. anand so, y intetent was to o preserve t the of m my farm. anand even thohouh we're 3 mononths into i it, it s pretty promising so far. maas: i thinknk the main reasona dairy farmer wouldn't do this is if they aren't certain about the future of the dairy itself, which is really the question facing a lot of families is, can they continue to be competitive in california, in the modern economy. and ththat's hard to d. it takes scale, it takes efficiency. it takes a lot of thingsgs, investmement in new

technologygy. many fararms would lilike to keep m milking cows ss long as they cocould, but n not every family can. arioso: a cow is s really an unbelelievable creature. i i me, they c consume tremendous amamos ofof byproducucts that wowould e waste prododucts, you u know. theyey're able to coconvert tht intnto milk andnd beef and now . maas: : this is eaeasily the largest t dairy biogogas projecn thehe united states. 3-4 million gallons of fuelel a year isis wt we ththink we'll prododuce, and we'll go upup from therere. so s digester, in terms of greenhouse gas s impacts, wouldld have thee impact as removing over 3,000 ccars from the r road. this is t we hope is thehe newest growth f the industry to try to produce more and more gas from america's dairiries. arioso: this gives us a way to tell our story and, you know, add to the story. youou know, wwe've had kind of the same e sy for a long g time, and we can

protetect the envnvironment, , t also, you know, kinind of contie down this path of energy independence, the next technology that can make, you know, our farms more effiicient and m more environmentally protective. shyler: i think that dairies in calilifornia havave gone thrhros and downs. mostly recentltly i's been totough times s for them. margins h haven't been ththere.s is an oppoportunity fofor them o kind of expand a littlele bit. n a way, , they aree entering the energy b business, w which is kd of cool.. ariioso: i'm pretty blessed.d. i mean, we have 4 generations on the farm. my dad is s still her. he just turnened 80. you know, d my grandson won't rereally appreciate this until later. having said that, i want the next generation t to know thehe potenential is ununlimited onont you c can do withth what you'u'e dodoing. you know, donon't evet short sighted and think that,

yoyou know, a all's s he can dot mimilk out o of a cow.w. this ia bebe another r way of mamaking r more efffficient, and d it's pry amazing. narrator: californian's concerned about climate change are searching for ways to reduce methane that stem from the ststate's s more than 5.2 millin cows. by contntrast, east africn farmers facing historic drought are turning to a traditional alternative to quench their thirst.

[camels vocalizing]

[laughter] [speaking native language]

[children singing]

warsame: i live in the u.s., in the state of georgia for the last 20 y years. and i i was a l estate attotorney, so i canan sl ice to an eskimo. camel milk is the next generation dairy. that's what i believeve. momost of the people are goioing healthy at the moment. and they believe that, you know, camel milk is medicinal. as a result of that, a lot of rich people or middle upper class are drinking it. . and mostly they're being prescribed by their doctors. we are working with universities and also research centers. they ccome here every 3 3 months. thy come and check samples of milk. and now we are working with the

allergy doctors in lactose intolerance. those one, they are responding g very positivevely. we haven't exported yet, but i will be very glad if i see my product on any supermarket on the shelf. that way i will know that i made it. [horn honks] man: from an early age, i was very interested in the deserts. during the teenage yeyears, i ud to spend a lot of time in northehern kenya. and then i end up doing 7 years' research on camel milk production. there's quite a long history with camels in the family. yeah, long may it last.

the body of research is now beginning to show the benefits of drinking camel's milk. we've also done some work here in kenya looking at diabetics. although we couldn't prove it statistically, it was definitely an improvement in blood sugar r control. and tha's another thing with camel's milk, it has a very high vitamin "c" content. so for societies who don't normally eat fruit or vegetables, that's where they've been getting their vitamin "c" sources and have been perfectly healthy y all this ti. on the other side, some of the benefits you might have heard is that it t has a slimming effece, that i it has good effecect on cholesterol and obesity. and so you may find that it t could actually y also benefefit nutrin issues in the western world. because of this long history of the benefits of drinking camel's milk, we're seeing more and more urban people taking an interest in buying camel's milk.

man: we're in nairobi cbd, actually, the central business district, at a somali restaurant. you ask fofor tea, they'll just bring you a camel tea without even asking. man: we have so many rather different types of products being taken out of this milk, camel milk. for example, we've got yogurt, we've got the carmel latte, which is loved specifically by the somalis. ahmed: it helps with my digestion. and, you know, i feel energized. and you can actually feel it instantly. when you drink, that day you'll actually feel it, like it's a detox. simpkin: with the human population growth globally, the world has been n more intensification in tererms of producing food for humans. we all know the e impact of livestk in terms of being blamed for global warming.g. in some countries, there's g gonna be ls rainfall or higher variability in the rainfall. and the camel

is going to be one of the best adapted animals to deal with that. so really they are an animal of the e future. announcer: "earth focus" is made possible in part by a grant from anne ray foundation, a margaret a. cargill philanthropy; the orange county community foundation; and the farvue foundation. evero

do two things one is to tell you a little bit about what monica of our line the c. e. o. at mother jones is a comp store there's here's and then i won. is about but i think she is you may from her today. the country. reaching eight million people every month. with investigativive reporting. that has changed the culture. and change the out of presidential elections and it's thanks t to peopople like you