Posted on 07/30/2022 5:20:07 AM PDT by FarCenter
In the U.S., people eat more protein than they need to. And though it might not be bad for human health, this excess does pose a problem for the country’s waterways. The nation’s wastewater is laden with the leftovers from protein digestion: nitrogen compounds that can feed toxic algal blooms and pollute the air and drinking water. This source of nitrogen pollution even rivals that from fertilizers washed off of fields growing food crops, new research suggests.
When we overconsume protein—whether it comes from lentils, supplements or steak—our body breaks the excess down into urea, a nitrogen-containing compound that exits the body via urine and ultimately ends up in sewage. Maya Almaraz, a biogeochemist at the University of California, Davis, and her colleagues wanted to see how much of this nitrogen is being flushed into the U.S. sewage system because of a protein-heavy diet. The researchers combined population data and previous work on how much excess protein the average American eats and found that the majority of nitrogen pollution present in wastewater—some 67 to 100 percent—is a by-product of what people consume. “We think a lot about sewage nitrogen. We know that’s an issue,” Almaraz says. “But I didn’t know how much of that is actually affected by the choices we’re making way upstream—when we go the grocery store, when we cook a meal and what we end up putting in our bodies.”
...
Their new study, published in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, broke down protein requirements by age (adults 50 to 70 years old need the most) for the current U.S. population and projected future populations out to 2055. By midcentury, the country’s population is expected to be larger overall and to have a greater percentage of older people. The researchers calculated the amount of nitrogen that would enter the environment if people ate today’s average American diet and if they instead reduced their protein intake to only what is nutritionally needed. This shift in diet alone could reduce the amount of nitrogen reaching aquatic ecosystems by 12 percent today and by nearly 30 percent in the future, according to the study’s results. Such a change could also help reduce damaging nitrogen pollution while wastewater infrastructure catches up.
The alledged global warming threat is nitrous oxide (aka laughing gas) emitting into the air from nitrogen fertilizers.
"N2O, also known as laughing gas, does not get nearly the attention it deserves, says David Kanter, a nutrient pollution researcher at New York University and vice chair of the International Nitrogen Initiative, an organization focused on nitrogen pollution research and policy making. “It’s a forgotten greenhouse gas,” he says. Yet molecule for molecule, N2O is about 300 times as potent as carbon dioxide at heating the atmosphere. And like CO2, it is long-lived, spending an average of 114 years in the sky before disintegrating. It also depletes the ozone layer. In all, the climate impact of laughing gas is no joke. IPCC scientists have estimated that nitrous oxide comprises roughly 6 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, and about three-quarters of those N2O emissions come from agriculture. "
Just have to come up with a way to extract the urea from the out flow of sewage treatment plants, sterilize it so there won't be any problems with bacteria or other germs in the product then make a usable fertilizer out of it.
My natural superabundance of testosterone make the trout out in the river here grow hair on their chests and thick beards. The eagles that survive trying to take them likewise now have deep baritone calls.
Tell the Rats to stop peeing on our backs and telling us it’s raining outside. Then we’ll talk.
These people never quit. I am sure they have plenty of idiots who want to appear smart and will parrot their nonsense.
Everybody had the same reaction I did. Chicken Little fear mongering of C02 causing global warming was not getting the job done. Now they pivot to NO2 and famine. Insanity.
ps
I don’t understand how commie Klaus and his ESG billionaires expect to survive the calamity they are bringing on the world. How do they expect to keep the security forces protecting them loyal? In the end, men with guns will determine who the survivors will be.
Is this an indirect way of preventing us from peeing on certain graves?
Even worse for us is that chemical dihydro-oxygen.
I read this mag years ago when it had actual science in it.
Scientific American has become distressingly woke since the creation of Springer Nature in 2015.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Springer_Nature
What irks me, is that these betters of ours prolly bemoaned this “excess protein” problem over a Surf ‘n Turf dinner.
As a man educated in the sciences I subscribed to Scientific America for years. That once great publication has gone political and abandoned science. I canceled my subscription.
Just use the pee for fertilizer.
Dear Lord Please Save Us from the Pee Protein Problem Pollutant™ !!! - (PPPP or P4 for short)
/s
Good one!
These crazies will never stop until they’re stopped once and for all
“I’m going to pee protein even harder!”
- Michael Scott
DRUG usage is another ‘pee problem’.
Only about 50% of drugs stay in the body-—the rest is excreted out into the ‘treatment plant’ water.
There are NO FILTERS to remove these drug residues.
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