Hi there! hope you are having a great week.

In today’s blog post, we would be examining the pollution from Mushroom Farming. More specifically, we would be discussing Robinson et al (2019)’s paper on the lifecycle analysis of the Agaricus bisporus, commonly known as the white or brown button mushroom. The white/brown button mushroom is the most common edible mushroom grown in the United States and around 1.4kg are consumed annually per capita (Robinson et al., 2019).

Mushrooms present an interesting Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) case as they are grown under unique conditions, using specially formulated compost in the dark and in climate-controlled environments. This is vastly different from most leafy crops which are traditionally ground in open fields, under direct sunlight and weather conditions.

Figure 1: Agaricus bisporus, White Button Mushroom 

In terms of Freshwater usage, around 9kg of freshwater is consumed by each kilogram of mushroom produced (Robinson et al., 2019). The water is mainly used by the background system in the mushroom farms and during electricity generation.

In terms of Global Warming Potential, mushrooms are found to have roughly 2.13 to 2.95 kg CO2 equivalent per kg of mushroom (Robinson et al., 2019). This is mainly contributed by the use of electricity, compost (medium to grow the mushroom) and fuel for transportation (Robinson et al., 2019). Mushrooms also produce a significant amount of Methane due to anaerobic decomposition and compost emissions.

Interestingly, Mushroom is actually comparatively more pollutive than leafy vegetables. According to another lifecycle assessment study, leaf lettuce grown in the United States was found to have a global warming potential of only 0.5kg CO2 equivalent per kg of Vegetables (Stone et al., 2021). Hence, consuming Mushrooms while being better than most meats is still not as good for the environment as vegetables.

Stay tuned for more interesting stories and discussions around food pollution.

 

References

Robinson, B., Winans, K., Kendall, A., Dlott, J. & Dlott, F. (2019). A life cycle assessment of Agaricus bisporus mushroom production in the USA. Int J Life Cycle Assess 24, 456–467. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11367-018-1456-6

Stone, T. F., Thompson, J. R., Rosentrater, K. A.,  Nair, A. (2021). A Lifecycle Assessment Approach for Vegetables in Large-, Mid-, and Small-Scale Food Systems in the Midwest US. Sustainability , 13, 11368. https://doi.org/10.3390/ su132011368

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