Climate Scientists Target Sandwiches In Battle Against Global Warming
Sandwiches carry with them the same carbon emission output as a car driven 12 miles, according to a study from the University of Manchester.
Researchers followed the whole life cycle of a sandwich, including the production of ingredients, and their packaging, as well as food waste. Bacon, ham, and sausages contribute the most to a sandwich’s carbon footprint.
“We need to change the labeling of food to increase the use-by date as these are usually quite conservative,” Professor Adisa Azapagic, who heads up the Sustainable Industrial Systems research group at the university, said in a Jan. 18 press statement.
“Given that sandwiches are a staple of the British diet as well as their significant market share in the food sector, it is important to understand the contribution from this sector to the emissions of greenhouse gases,” Azapagic said.
They estimate that breakfast sandwich generates 1441 grams of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2 eq.), which is equivalent to driving a car to the grocery store and back. Consuming 11.5 billion sandwiches annually in the UK generates roughly 9.5 million tons of CO2e, which is equivalent to the annual use of 8.6 million cars.’
Researchers also recommend drastically reducing certain ingredients that have a higher carbon footprint, like lettuce, tomato, cheese and meat. Slashing cheese and meat from sandwiches toppings would also reduce the number of calories and make people healthier.
The study also suggested emissions could be cut by 50 percent if changes were made to the recipes, packaging and waste disposal.
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Al Shelton
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Great! Keep on making and eating sandwiches as they are increasing the amount of plant food
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Carl
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These scientists must have slept through their biology and bio-chemistry classes.
The Earth’s flora and fauna have been in a symbiotic relationship for hundreds of millions of years. The flora using the power of sunlight combines carbon dioxide (CO2) and water (H2O) into carbohydrates (CH2O) and releases free oxygen (O2) into the air in an endothermic, biochemical process called photosynthesis.
Scientific formula for photosynthesis:
CO2 + H2O + sunlight → CH2O + O2
Animals then eat those carbohydrates (CH2O) and breath in that oxygen (O2) and their metabolism reverses the chemical reaction that occurs in photosynthesis in order to harvest the energy stored in carbohydrates—energy that originally came from the Sun. That energy, in turn, sustains the animal’s bodily metabolic functions. The “burning” of carbohydrates (combining them with oxygen [O2] in an exothermic chemical reaction) produces as byproducts the very molecules that plants use in photosynthesis—carbon dioxide (CO2) and water vapor (H2O), which animals exhale into the atmosphere through their breath to be used again in plant photosynthesis.
Scientific formula for animal metabolism:
C6H12O6 + 6 O2 → 6 CO2 + 6 H2O + free energy
The scientific formula for hydrocarbon oxidation (burning “fossil fuels”) is nearly identical to that of animal metabolism and yields the same life giving molecules:
CH4 + 2O2 → CO2 + 2H2O + free energy
For hundreds of millions of years plants through photosynthesis have been producing food for animals to eat and oxygen for them to breathe and in return animals have been producing carbon dioxide for plants to use again in photosynthesis and the cycle repeats over and over and over again. At its current rate of increase carbon dioxide will not reach the optimal level for the most robust plant growth (~1,000 ppm) for at least three centuries.
I marvel at how these two life-giving molecules–carbon dioxide (CO2) and water (H2O) in the form of water vapor–that have been the foundation of organic life on Earth for hundreds of millions of years are suddenly being seen by otherwise intelligent, well educated scientists as the doom of the natural environment. Is it really that easy to fool people? Just rename CO2 and H2O “greenhouse gases” and suddenly they become in the minds of otherwise intelligent, well educated scientists “pollutants” when once they were universally known to be the foundation of organic life on Earth?
This has to be the first example of scientific regression. As science has progressed over the years pseudoscientific fallacies have given way to scientific truth. This is the only example I know of where scientific truth has given way to a pseudoscientific fallacy.
(Note: If you are going to call carbon dioxide a “pollutant” then you have to call water vapor a “pollutant” because, according to them, its effect on global temperatures is the same as that of carbon dioxide only much more intense, according to them.)
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GPAltaBob
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I’m sorry, but I just can’t stop laughing!
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Rosco
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How can a sandwich have a footprint ?
Sandwiches cause diabetes AND global warming. WOW.
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