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In the United States, the food industry alone accounts for approximately 19% of the total energy consumed. The objective of this study is to forecast the food-related energy consumption and evaluate policy alternatives for reducing food related energy consumption in the medium and long term. Influential factors of energy consumption in the food industry include population growth rate, GDP, agriculture's share of GDP, food waste, technologies, and agricultural investment. Based on the life cycle of the food industry, five life stages were considered: agricultural production, industrial processing and packaging, transportation, wholesale and retail, and household. In this study, based on the causal relationships and feedback loops between these factors and the energy consumed for each life stage, a system dynamics (SD) model was designed to simulate the situation for the US food industry. Policy options of reducing waste percentage and improving industrial energy productivity are incorporated for building the energy use mitigation scenarios. By implementing the integrated mitigation scenarios, a 9.43% reduction in total food system energy consumption can be attained in 2030. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United States lags other nations in adapting policy approaches that would stimulate cleaner consumption of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) by limiting the use of potentially toxic materials in electronics production. This study analyzes nationally-representative U.S. data from a unique web-based survey to investigate whether American households are willing to support greening the ICT devices by paying a premium for a green cell phone. Green cell phone does not contain hazardous materials and can be safely disposed with general municipal waste. A survey-based economic technique of contingent valuation was utilized to examine the relationship between socio-psychological and economic parameters for evaluating and explaining a stated willingness to pay a green phone premium, controlling for socio-economic and demographic characteristics. The findings indicate that respondents with higher scores on general environmental beliefs, greater engagement in pro-environmental behavior, and positive attitudes toward recycling small electronics are likely to be willing to pay a premium to purchase a green cell phone compared to a conventional cell phone with similar capabilities. This suggests that educating the public about benefits of electronics recycling, promoting pro-environmental norms, and encouraging pro-environmental behavior can help increase public support for implementing policies aimed at greening ICT production and consumption in the United Sates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]