
Animal Welfare Approved
By Andrew Gunther
Last week, The Daily broke the news that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) planned to buy 7 million pounds of Boneless Lean Beef Trimmings (BLBT)—otherwise known as “pink slime”—for school lunches. Some reports state that 70 percent of prepackaged grind on retailers’ shelves contain it. The resulting backlash has had more effect than anyone expected. Following a public outcry and hundreds of thousands of signatories to petitions to try to get the product out of schools, Beef Products, Inc. (BPI), the world’s leading producer of BLBT, has launched a new counteroffensive website, “pink slime is a myth.” So where does the truth lie?
Obviously, Boneless Lean Meat Trimmings sounds a lot more appetizing than “pink slime.” But whatever you call it, what is it? And how is it produced? The “pink slime is a myth” website says that BLBT is the meat and fat that is trimmed away when beef is cut. This is true as far as it goes. But BLBT isn’t quite the same as the bits of meat that you or your butcher might cut off the edge of a steak or other piece of meat. BLBT is the fatty trimmings that even BPI agrees couldn’t be separated with the knife. In the past, these trimmings were used for pet food or converted into oil rather than being served as hamburgers to people.
BPI discovered that first simmering the trimmings so that the fat separates from the muscle, and then using a centrifuge to spin off the fat and so extract the protein from the trimmings, resulted in a lean product that could be used in food. The next challenge was to make this recovered “meat” safe to eat. BPI is well aware—having commissioned its own reports in the past—that trimmings from the outer surface of the beef carcass have the potential for greater contamination with bacteria than other cuts of meat. These scraps of meat are susceptible to contamination with E. coli and Salmonella. The BPI answer is to send the centrifuged “meat” mixture through pipes where it is sprayed with ammonia gas intended to kill the bacteria. The end product may not exactly look like “slime”—and some of the photos accompanying blogs on this topic have actually been of recovered poultry meat rather than beef—but it certainly doesn’t look like beef either.
Some estimates suggest that as well as being put into school food, 70 percent of all hamburgers contain at least some “pink slime.” BPI says that BLBT “rarely” makes up more than 25 percent of the final product—but that’s still a lot of recovered meat “waste” that wouldn’t be in any hamburger you made from beef you’d ground at home. Interestingly, when Beef magazine’s website ran a story deriding the “media hysteria” and supporting the new “pink slime is a myth” website, the comments from ranchers—a group not generally inclined to take a non-industry line—were disparaging. The general feeling was that beef producers could not and should not defend this product. It seems that everyone aside from those making money from pink slime can see that when you have to use a centrifuge and add ammonia to fatty scraps of meat to make it lean and “safe,” you really shouldn’t be trying to sell it as “beef.”
Even the fast food companies McDonald‘s, Burger King and Taco Bell stopped using meat that was treated with ammonia last year. These are not companies that sell their products as being healthy and wholesome—yet they recognize that this treated meat fills consumers with distaste. Today, the grocery chain Kroger released a list of products containing “pink slime” so you can avoid them should you wish. Kroger is honest enough to admit the presence of pink slime, and hopefully the company is considering removing it from its stores.
So, if pink slime isn’t good enough for McDonald’s, why on earth does the USDA think it is good enough for our children? One argument is that with tight budgets, ammonia-treated recovered meat is a cheaper option to provide protein in school lunches. But the estimates I’ve seen suggest that the savings are as little as a few cents a pound. While this adds up to a fair amount when you buy 7 million pounds of meat, are the savings really worth it?
The picture does not improve when you see what former USDA microbiologists say about BLBT. Gerald Zirnstein was the man who first coined the phrase “pink slime” in an email message to colleagues back in 2002. He said that calling the product “ground beef” as USDA wanted to do amounted to “fraudulent labeling.” Another USDA scientist, Carl Custer, interviewed a few days ago was concerned that the department had approved the ammonia treated beef for sale without obtaining independent confirmation that the product did not have a food safety risk. Yet, in 2009, there were two back-to-back incidents of salmonella contamination which caused 52,000 pounds of BLBT to be recalled.
With amazing shamelessness, the American Meat Institute (AMI) is also trying to promote pink slime as being sustainable. Their argument is that utilizing these trimmings in a world where red meat protein supplies are decreasing and global demand is increasing is a good thing and improves the efficiency of the beef industry. But this product wasn’t wasted before BPI came along with its centrifuges and ammonia—it had less profitable uses. And sustainability—as well as feeding the world an adequate supply of protein—is far more complex than ensuring a constant supply of a protein that no one in their right mind would want to eat. We can do a lot more to feed the world in a sustainable way by thinking about our eating habits and purchasing high-welfare pasture-raised meat.
Some within the USDA pushed for pink slime to be listed as an ingredient on the hamburger patties to which it was added. But because the substance was designated simply as “meat,” there’s no way of knowing if it’s been added to the grocery store grind that you’re buying. Likewise, the USDA considers ammonia gas a “processing agent” rather than an ingredient, so the addition of ammonia does not have to be listed anywhere.
This is the same old story—if you want to be sure of what you’re getting, then you need to buy meat from farmers who are producing a high quality, unadulterated product—a product that doesn’t need to be treated with ammonia hydroxide in order to reduce the risk of food poisoning. A product that is truly sustainable. You need to look for meat produced by Animal Welfare Approved farmers.
If you do nothing else, sign this petition to get “pink slime” out of our children’s diets. Sign the petition to the USDA by clicking here.
For more information, click here.
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Wisdom the mōlī, or Laysan albatross, is the oldest wild bird known to science at the age of at least 70. She is also, as of February 1, a new mother.
<div id="dadb2" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="aa2ad8cb566c9b4b6d2df2693669f6f9"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1357796504740761602" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">🚨Cute baby alert! Wisdom's chick has hatched!!! 🐣😍 Wisdom, a mōlī (Laysan albatross) and world’s oldest known, ban… https://t.co/Nco050ztBA</div> — USFWS Pacific Region (@USFWS Pacific Region)<a href="https://twitter.com/USFWSPacific/statuses/1357796504740761602">1612558888.0</a></blockquote></div>
The Science Behind Frozen Wind Turbines – and How to Keep Them Spinning Through the Winter
By Hui Hu
Winter is supposed to be the best season for wind power – the winds are stronger, and since air density increases as the temperature drops, more force is pushing on the blades. But winter also comes with a problem: freezing weather.
Comparing rime ice and glaze ice shows how each changes the texture of the blade. Gao, Liu and Hu, 2021, CC BY-ND
Ice buildup changes air flow around the turbine blade, which can slow it down. The top photos show ice forming after 10 minutes at different temperatures in the Wind Research Tunnel. The lower measurements show airflow separation as ice accumulates. Icing Research Tunnel of Iowa State University, CC BY-ND
How ice builds up on the tips of turbine blades. Gao, Liu and Hu, 2021, CC BY-ND
While traditional investment in the ocean technology sector has been tentative, growth in Israeli maritime innovations has been exponential in the last few years, and environmental concern has come to the forefront.
theDOCK aims to innovate the Israeli maritime sector. Pexels
<p>The UN hopes that new investments in ocean science and technology will help turn the tide for the oceans. As such, this year kicked off the <a href="https://www.oceandecade.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030)</a> to galvanize massive support for the blue economy.</p><p>According to the World Bank, the blue economy is the "sustainable use of ocean resources for economic growth, improved livelihoods, and jobs while preserving the health of ocean ecosystem," <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160412019338255#b0245" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Science Direct</a> reported. It represents this new sector for investments and innovations that work in tandem with the oceans rather than in exploitation of them.</p><p>As recently as Aug. 2020, <a href="https://www.reutersevents.com/sustainability/esg-investors-slow-make-waves-25tn-ocean-economy" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Reuters</a> noted that ESG Investors, those looking to invest in opportunities that have a positive impact in environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues, have been interested in "blue finance" but slow to invest.</p><p>"It is a hugely under-invested economic opportunity that is crucial to the way we have to address living on one planet," Simon Dent, director of blue investments at Mirova Natural Capital, told Reuters.</p><p>Even with slow investment, the blue economy is still expected to expand at twice the rate of the mainstream economy by 2030, Reuters reported. It already contributes $2.5tn a year in economic output, the report noted.</p><p>Current, upward <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/-innovation-blue-economy-2646147405.html" target="_self">shifts in blue economy investments are being driven by innovation</a>, a trend the UN hopes will continue globally for the benefit of all oceans and people.</p><p>In Israel, this push has successfully translated into investment in and innovation of global ports, shipping, logistics and offshore sectors. The "Startup Nation," as Israel is often called, has seen its maritime tech ecosystem grow "significantly" in recent years and expects that growth to "accelerate dramatically," <a href="https://itrade.gov.il/belgium-english/how-israel-is-becoming-a-port-of-call-for-maritime-innovation/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">iTrade</a> reported.</p><p>Driving this wave of momentum has been rising Israeli venture capital hub <a href="https://www.thedockinnovation.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">theDOCK</a>. Founded by Israeli Navy veterans in 2017, theDOCK works with early-stage companies in the maritime space to bring their solutions to market. The hub's pioneering efforts ignited Israel's maritime technology sector, and now, with their new fund, theDOCK is motivating these high-tech solutions to also address ESG criteria.</p><p>"While ESG has always been on theDOCK's agenda, this theme has become even more of a priority," Nir Gartzman, theDOCK's managing partner, told EcoWatch. "80 percent of the startups in our portfolio (for theDOCK's Navigator II fund) will have a primary or secondary contribution to environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria."</p><p>In a company presentation, theDOCK called contribution to the ESG agenda a "hot discussion topic" for traditional players in the space and their boards, many of whom are looking to adopt new technologies with a positive impact on the planet. The focus is on reducing carbon emissions and protecting the environment, the presentation outlines. As such, theDOCK also explicitly screens candidate investments by ESG criteria as well.</p><p>Within the maritime space, environmental innovations could include measures like increased fuel and energy efficiency, better monitoring of potential pollution sources, improved waste and air emissions management and processing of marine debris/trash into reusable materials, theDOCK's presentation noted.</p>theDOCK team includes (left to right) Michal Hendel-Sufa, Head of Alliances, Noa Schuman, CMO, Nir Gartzman, Co-Founder & Managing Partner, and Hannan Carmeli, Co-Founder & Managing Partner. Dudu Koren
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