In an article from ENN.com new studies have shown that the percentage of energy waste generated from from food waste is no small amount. Researchers Amanda D. Cuellar and Michael E. Webber of the University of Texas at Austin estimate that every year the amount of food thrown away by the united states is equivalent to 325 million barrels of oil wasted.
There are two main reasons why so much food waste is being generated. One is the amount of time it takes to get a product from the place of growth or production to the customer before it goes bad. The second reason provided is in consumption itself. Often restaurants are seen throwing bulging bags of discarded food into their dumpsters. The blame can't be placed entirely on commercial areas however when residences are throwing away food as well.
Cuellar and Webber also try to make people see the connection between food waste and energy. The food production industry has recently benefited from the use of new technologies, unfortunately they're based on fossil fules which makes the food production industry dependent on fossil fuels.
In a time when people are so focused on alternative energy sources, it is important to take all areas that use the energy into consideration. Cuellar and Webber emphasize this point by citing new research which says that food production and waste make up 18% of this country's energy usage (16% and and 2% respectively).
This article certainly provides some food for thought and will hopefully make more people think when they set out to make dinner or go out to a restaurant: "How much am I wasting?"
Lora Mathers
I don't see what this has to do with animal communication....
ReplyDeleteIt doesn't have to, this from the class website:
ReplyDelete"You will be to looking around the web at popular sources of articles on ecology, and providing short descriptions/links to these articles. Alternatively or in combination with popular articles, you can provide summaries/links to a current article(s) in the scientific literature. A final approach would be to post a blog entry on some ecological observations you’ve made, interpreting those observations, and providing some factual references for your interpretations.
This assignment’s main goals are to get you used to exploring the world of ecology as a matter of daily, or at least weekly habit, to get you used to interacting with others on the web in a constructive manner, to get you to learn how to communicate something that you’ve learned in clear and concise writing, and to introduce you to this new form of communicating science."
How do you think we can manipulate trash seperation on a local level to possibly take advantage of this waste being thrown away?
ReplyDeleteInteresting article
Ahmed Sandakli