That’s what Japan is trying to do, the country is looking at using these ubiquitous utensils for biofuel production. Each of Japan’s 127 million residents uses on average 200 pairs of chopsticks a year. That’s equal to 90,000 tons of wood a year. It’s nice that they’re finding use for this waste, but it’d be better if people just brought their own chopsticks in the first place. China is on that tone, looking to eliminate the 45 billion pairs of disposable chopsticks it uses every year. Read the whole article here.
If you don’t know a lot about biofuel production, almost any sort of waste product can be converted into fuel. Wooden chopsticks are relatively easy to convert (compared to say plastic waste) as it can converted to ethanol through pyrolysis. I could go on for several posts about the different types of biofuel production so this much information will have to suffice. If you’re facing a craving check out the wiki entry here.
from Japan Probe
