Sustainability
We were practicing sustainability long before it became a buzzword.
It’s a simple concept: Do what’s right by the land, by your neighbors, by the animals you raise, and by the customer. These days, people call it sustainability. We’ve always thought of it as good common sense.
It makes sense to capture our methane because it means far less odor for the community and carbon offset credits for us. It’s smart to upgrade equipment so we can treat and re-introduce 96 percent of the water we use. It’s good business to sell our cattle’s waste to create the organic fertilizer that nourishes the fields where our local feed is grown.
We don’t do these things because they’re trendy. We ask ourselves, “Is this the right thing to do?” If the answer is yes, we do it. Simple as that. To preserve our resources for future generations, we implement sustainablility through every step of the beef lifecycle. Specific practices include:
- Rotational grazing program promotes healthy rangelands at the Double R Ranch.
- Source a majority of our cattle feed within 150 miles of each feeding location.
- Use composting to recycle cattle waste into nutrient-rich fertilizer for area farmers.
- Comprehensive reduction of wastewater. We have reduced our water use by 40% per pound of beef at AB Washington Beef.
- Capture biogas to power our processing plant. Biogas resources have displaced 20% of our natural gas needs.