Guy Goes Green

Wannabe green guy going green

Posts Tagged ‘composting’

Ashley promotes food conservation and composting

November 11th, 2009

I hate wasting money. Who doesn’t? If you could save some money, wouldn’t you? If you think of how much money you waste throwing away food, you’d be surprised. Half of an avocado, $0.60; a half dozen eggs, $0.60; half a carton of Half and Half, $0.75… and that is in Fargo, ND. This doesn’t include fresh produce that can be very expensive in the winter months. Especially now that Ben and I are eating healthier, we need to make sure we are eating all of our food, and throwing away none.

Ben and I have not been horrible at wasting food, but to me, even wasting a potato annoys me. I think that if I would have planned meals better we wouldn’t have had this issue. This week is the end of us wasting food. We have found several ways to prevent this from happening. Mrs. Green from MyZeroWaste.com says that by keeping foods on the top shelf that need to be used first before anything new. This is a great tip I would have never thought about. This may require a little reorganizing of our fridge, but will likely do. Another tip which we will implement is putting a dry erase board on our fridge that will help us see what we have to use up without digging. Then just erase when it’s gone. This challenge for Ben will also allow him to be more creative when it comes to preparing meals.

Another way to prevent this food waste from going into the garbage and also save money is to compost it. Yes, you still waste food, but you make up the money in the nutrient rich soil you make from it. This will give you better results from your organic gardening. In North Dakota you can’t compost outdoors in the winter because the temperature plummets below freezing for about 4 months. We invested in a NatureMill Composter that we put into our garage to keep the compost brewing throughout winter. It runs on approximately $0.50 worth of electricity per month, doesn’t take up much space, made from recycled materials and you can get a batch of compost ready for the garden in 2 weeks instead of 3 months. Did I also mention it’s made in the USA? Everyone should purchase one of these.

Besides saving tons of money, we will also reduce our waste output for the city and reduce the amount of methane gas that is released into the atmosphere. Reducing food waste has a snowball effect on our carbon footprint. We’ll save money, create more meals and help the environment. Also, since we don’t put out the garbage unless the bin is full, many times weeks between, the garbage man won’t idle his engine while unloading our garbage. With the great soil we’ll get from food scraps we’ll have a better garden next year. If you have any other suggestions on how to eliminate food waste, please comment below.

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Posted in Ashley's Posts, Week 4 Food Waste, earth

Tags: compost composting food scraps food waste green reuse waste

Eye opening statistics on food waste

November 10th, 2009

This week my challenge is to reduce food waste in our household. While researching this task, I found some eye opening statistics on the way America consumes food.

Americans waste 96 BILLION pounds of food every year, although some argue that this is old data and underestimated.
If only 25% of 96 billion pounds of food were recovered, we could feed 20 million people… this would MORE than enough to feed every hungry child in America. That is also the entire nation of Mozambique that could be fed. We could feed entire nations with this waste.
Americans throw away 25% of the food we prepare
We produce twice as much food as needed per person
Landfills account for the largest human related source of methane, which is a greenhouse gas 21 times more potent than carbon dioxide.
The food we throw away costs households money.
Food disposal costs the US about 1 billion dollars.
An average household of four throws away $590/year in food.
Wasted food may also have wasted packaging, transportation costs, agricultural costs and other secondary environmental impacts.

These are some fairly staggering statistics and I think the purpose of this week’s challenge has changed slightly for me. I went into this with the thought that I would be trying to find a way to help the environment, but I think this also needs to include a way that we are getting unused food to people who can use it.

Now that I know the WHY of food waste conservation, I will need to figure out the how. We will do what we can to buy only what we will need, reduce the waste of our food purchases and get appropriate food items to those who can use it. In the comments area below, please let me know if you have any ideas or experiences in regards to non-wasteful food usage, composting and creative ways to preserve food or experience with food pantries.