Engineering sustainability

Discuss about the Sustainable Engineering Practices in Food Production and Processing.

There is an increase in the growing number of human population and this has of no doubt come to the public interest that in the near future, there are various practices including lifestyle which will not be able to be sustainable. This is because there comes at a time when the resources will be too limited to satisfy all the human population. Sustainability in engineering can be defined as the process of coming up with engineering solutions with regards to taking into consideration the environmental impacts.  There are various sustainable engineering practices which have been put into place to ensure that biodiversity is protected or the future generation will have to bear a lot of hardships (Alexander K, 2015, p. 775). 

Some of the sustainable practices may include manufacturing process, use of renewable technologies, extraction of materials or minerals, infrastructure challenges, food production among others.

The case study in question is food production and processing. Generally, food is an integral part of human life and existence. Since time immemorial, the population of human beings was smaller and it was mandatory that human beings must eat in order to survive.  However, the resources were unlimited and hence as populations grew there was a need for processing of food.  Then there came the period of industrialization whereby the food sector had to be industrialized in order to meet the needs and demand of the ever-growing population .this also promoted to the rise of urban settling as more people would be comfortable living in the urban centers where they would still be able to access food (Benjamin S, 2015, p. 976).

Thus, as time goes, there are constant increases in population thereby a need for coming up with sustainable ways of food production and processing became a necessity.  This is because there are various factors which influence the need to adopt sustainable ways of producing food which may include climate change and health. According to the 2015 research, the population of the earth was estimated to be approximately 9 billion. This means that if there is an inadequacy in the supply of food, then there will be a serious global challenge of food.  Presently, approximately 3 billion persons have been left malnourished due to a shortage of food and deficiency of iron. Surprisingly, more than 40 %of the food produced goes to waste as unused or not fully utilized yet the resources that are present have been over exhausted (Buch, 2016, p. 886).

Objectives of the research

 The main objective of this report is to come up with sustainable ways of producing and processing food. There are numerous challenges that we face in relation to the manner in which food is produced and processed. These factors include environmental concerns such as  land use , decrease of biodiversity, aquatic eutrophication by nitrogenous substances caused by over-fertilization, global warming caused by enteric fermentation and use of fossil fuels, aquatic eutrophication by phosphorous substances caused by fertilizers overuse, famine and water shortages , Eco toxicity, and human effects of pesticides (Zeiher, 2016, p. 995).

These factors directly pose as threats to sustainability.  Over time, they continue to exist and soon it will be very difficult to manage food concerns globally. The below-proposed ways of food production and processing will help in solving the issues to do with food scarcity (Norimoto K, 2016, p. 864).

Food must be constantly produced and processed to meet the demand of the ever-growing population. This involves primary stages, secondary stages and the tertiary stages. Below are some of the best practices that will sustainably help in food production and processing (Columbia., 2015, p. 432). 

Enzymes are biological catalysts which will help in speeding up the rate of reaction thereby overall helps in saving time, cost and energy.  These enzymes are advantageous in terms of their sensitivity, inaction techniques, toxicity and also concentration. At low concentration, these enzymes are very active and since they are biological, they do not produce any toxic substances.  Besides, the enzymes are environmentally friendly and will not cause any environmental pollution as compared to other means of production.  Their specificity means that they result in products that are more consistent.  Examples of enzymes that may be used include lipases, carbohydrates, transferees, oxidoreductases among others (Oliver, 2015, p. 200).

Food safety is one of the most significant factors that is also taken into consideration when dealing with food production. This is because when the food is not safe, it may end up resulting in food poisoning. Traditionally, various methods of food preservation had been used including  Thermal treatments, I.e. refrigeration, pasteurization, sterilization, chemical preservatives aseptic processing. These methods have been primarily put into practice to minimize the microbial loads and promote food safety and shelf life.

Many of these operations require a lot of energy and a proposed techniques which utilize less amount of energy and has reduced environmental impacts is highly recommended for sustainability purposes. These sustainable methods may comprise microwave and radio-frequency heating, high-pressure processing, ionizing radiation, pulsed electric fields,  ohmic heating, ultraviolet light treatment, and ionization (Frank, 2017, p. 214).

Use of enzymes

Universally, Drying has been used by most companies to help in the preservation of many foodstuff. It helps in the processing of bulk food products thus overall reducing the transportation costs as well as enhancing the shelf life. On the contrary, it utilizes a high amount of energy and when it can be replaced by less energy-intensive techniques for example pressing, centrifugation, and separation of the membrane, filtration, coagulation, and sedimentation, before commencing the drying process (Santamouris, 2015, p. 564).

There are various sustainability factors which are related to food production and processing. These factors may include environmental concerns such as

• Land use – in many parts of the world, most of the methods employed in agriculture have adverse effects on the fertility of the land. Most of the practices that are employed degrade the soil off useful minerals and with time the soil is left infertile. Thus, the manner in which land use is affected calls for sustainable methods of food production (Thomas, 2006, p. 761).
• The decrease of biodiversity- both the plant and animal life have been reduced. over time, many of the plants and animals that may be dibble become extinct thereby prompting the need for sustainably in food production
• Population growth – with the ever-growing population. The demand for food keeps on increasing thereby a need for sustainable ways of food production which are environmental friendly are encouraged(Fred K, 2016, p. 363).
• Availability of arable lands- there are very many lands that are able to produce good produce when agriculturally utilized. The presence of these lands makes it viable to adopt sustainable ways of producing and processing food.
• Climate change and food availability- over the past, the climate has been constantly changing and being unfavorable to both human and plant life. The plant life is at risk of redundant growth, hence making the supply of food to be at risks.  This, therefore, calls for the adoption of sustainable ways of food production and processing (Wolter J, 2016, p. 329).
• Aquatic eutrophication – this is as a result of nitrogenous substances caused by over-fertilization. The use of chemicals during farming slowly degrades the existence of aquatic life
• Global warming- this is generally caused by enteric fermentation and use of fossil fuels. The overall aftermath makes the temperatures of the earth to be hot hence making the plant and human life unbearable. When this happens, the supply of food to meet the high demand for food globally is compromised (Goncalves, 2016, p. 543).
• Famine and water shortages – besides other factors, situations of famine influences the need for sustainable food processing and production techniques. Some parts of the universe experience diverse famine conditions thereby prompting the need for sustainable means of food production.

The report is generally about the current trends and solutions using sustainable engineering practices.it specifically focuses on food production.  There has been a constant increase in the human population and hence the need for coming up with techniques which help in meeting the demands of the high population.  The traditional techniques that have been in use in food processing and production are increasing posing a risk to the availability of food in the near future.  The paper presents other techniques which are environmentally friendly and are sustainable in that they are easily adopted without too much constrains.  For instance the use of Use of enzymes which are biological catalysts and help in speeding up the rate of reaction thereby overall in saving time, cost and energy. These enzymes are advantageous in terms of their sensitivity, inaction techniques, toxicity and also concentration. At low concentration, these enzymes are very active and since they are biological, they do not produce any toxic substances (Graham, 2015, p. 442).

Adoption of the Microbial food control -traditionally, various methods of food preservation had been used including Thermal treatments such as refrigeration, pasteurization, among other practice to minimize the microbial loads and promote food safety and shelf life. These operations require a lot of energy and a proposed techniques which utilize less amount of energy and has reduced environmental impacts is highly recommended for sustainability purposes such as ionizing radiation, ultraviolet light treatment

besides the Use of green drying schemes which applies less energy-intensive techniques, for example, pressing, centrifugation, separation of the membrane, filtration, coagulation, and sedimentation, before commencing the drying process also have been recommended to replace the traditional methods (Maldonado, 2016, p. 988).

Conclusion

Food is an integral part of human existence and its continued production and processing is of great significance .over the decades and years to come, the population of human increase and thus the demand for food keeps increasing. However, sousing the same old traditional means of food production and processing may end up resulting in situations of food shortage. Thus the sustainable practices which h have been outlined above can help in preventing such situation. Thus, sustainable practices are highly recommended for the continued meeting of the ever-growing food demand (Moubray, 2015, p. 732).

References

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