Dr Dietrich Tegtmeyer writes on Linkedin that according to FAO statistics about 350 million cattle hides are generated annually by the meat industry. If they would bio-degrade back to carbon dioxide following the natural cycle about ca. 4.5 million tons biogenic CO2 will be released again.

The production of Leather could be a solution to decarbonise this massive CO2 tonnage emission.

Every year about 190 Mio hides are processed to leather, a long lasting and highly versatile material. The leather manufacturing process therefore captures about 2.5 Mio tons of CO2 for many years – this is a form of Decarbonisation.

Instead promoting the so-called “vegan” or fossil based plastic alternatives, it should be a priority to process even the remaining number of available cattle hides to a usable leather.