Methane gas from cow burps and other sources accelerates global warming. Here’s a genetic tweaking technique that could transform it into organic fertilizer

A Bay Area biotech firm is working on a clever strategy to capture a worrisome greenhouse gas, and in the process turn it into a rich organic fertilizer.

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At Windfall Bio, vials containing a pink liquid may hold the key to the solution. The liquid contains methane-eating microbes, usually found in soil.

These microbes are able to pull methane out of the environment, and by consuming it, the microbes then transform a climate-harming gas into a beneficial product – in this case, valuable organic fertilizer.

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The idea is to provide the microbes to where the methane is created: on farms, cattle ranches, landfills water treatment plants, and the fossil fuel industry.

The microbes will be freeze dried before they are shipped, and then resuscitated with liquid nutrients before being applied to the land.

“Then they should come back alive and that’s how they can do their jobs,” explained Windfall Bio Biologist Dr. Judy Su.

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