British Vision Issue 73, 麦当劳的环保步伐

So let's go back to Sheffield to that whole plan by McDonald's to try and burn the waste and the leftovers¹ from their burgers and the packaging to try and turn it all into household energy. Lucy Manning reports from Sheffield.

Their ads say their customers are loving it, but what no one much likes is the amount of rubbish McDonald's and other big businesses generate every day.

So the Golden Arches are trying to take on a greener tint². A pilot project in Sheffield will see 11 MacDonald's restaurants turn their waste into heat and electricity for local buildings. It works something like this: take a MacDonald's burger, chuck it away, take that and a hundred tons of rubbish each restaurant generates a year. And instead of taking it to a landfill, drive it down the road to an energy recovery plant, mix it up with some of Sheffield's other rubbish, burn it in an incinerator and get electricity and heat.

We've got a real serious issue to address here in Britain overall. And that is there is just too much rubbish being buried in the land. There is too much waste going to landfill. I think it's incumbent³ on big, big businesses, business like McDonald's to try and find innovative⁴ solutions ‘coz we all have aspirations⁵ to send zero waste to landfill. But bringing that into reality is something of a challenge for us.

MacDonald's has done much over the last few years to try and rebrand itself. And now like a lot of other companies, it's choosing to go down the green route. But will my filleted fish, milk shake and chips really make a difference to the planet.

The amount of electricity and heat it creates is not gonna be that great. In fact, this entire scheme covering 11 stores is gonna provide the heat and electricity for about 50 homes, that's all, 50 homes. And even if you extended it across the whole of the MacDonald's estate, it would only be 5,000 homes. So it's good, but it's nowhere near enough.

What more do you think needs to be done for McDonald's to go green? Well, there is an astonishing fact that they have released, haven't they? They've told us that each store, each individual MacDonald's produces 100 tons of waste a year, that is the most enormous amount of waste. And that what MacDonald's really ought to be working on now is trying to diminish that, trying to cut that to a reasonable level.

But MacDonald's says it has tried to minimize packaging and improve recycling. Its delivery vehicles will soon be powered with used cooking oil and it hopes it can lead the way on dealing⁶ with waste.

One things that MacDonald can't bring is scalability to positive programmes such as this, so if being proven out in its 11-restaurant green city trial, then the potential across 1,200 restaurant estate and across the broader food industry and general commercial waste is huge.

But there're only around 20 of these energy recovery plants across the country and unless more are built, that's going to mean long drives for the rubbish, reversing any green benefits and green campaigners say no matter how hard MacDonald's tries to be environmentally-friendly, the fact (that) its core product is beef means it will always struggle. The vegetarian⁷ society has launched this campaign, warning people about what it calls the dangerous emissions⁸ from cattle, more deadly it says than the effect on climate change of the transport system across the world, but this link between diet and global warming may be more difficult for the Big-Mac-Generation to stomach.

1 leftovers   

n.剩余物，残留物，剩菜

参考例句：

• He can do miracles with a few kitchen leftovers.他能用厨房里几样剩饭做出一顿美餐。
• She made supper from leftovers she had thrown together.她用吃剩的食物拼凑成一顿晚饭。

2 tint   

n.淡色，浅色；染发剂；vt.着以淡淡的颜色

参考例句：

• You can't get up that naturalness and artless rosy tint in after days.你今后不再会有这种自然和朴实无华的红润脸色。
• She gave me instructions on how to apply the tint.她告诉我如何使用染发剂。

3 incumbent   

adj.成为责任的，有义务的；现任的，在职的

参考例句：

• He defeated the incumbent governor by a large plurality.他以压倒多数票击败了现任州长。
• It is incumbent upon you to warn them.你有责任警告他们。

4 innovative   

adj.革新的，新颖的，富有革新精神的

参考例句：

• Discover an innovative way of marketing.发现一个创新的营销方式。
• He was one of the most creative and innovative engineers of his generation.他是他那代人当中最富创造性与革新精神的工程师之一。

5 aspirations   

强烈的愿望( aspiration的名词复数 )； 志向； 发送气音； 发 h 音

参考例句：

• I didn't realize you had political aspirations. 我没有意识到你有政治上的抱负。
• The new treaty embodies the aspirations of most nonaligned countries. 新条约体现了大多数不结盟国家的愿望。

6 dealing   

n.经商方法，待人态度

参考例句：

• This store has an excellent reputation for fair dealing.该商店因买卖公道而享有极高的声誉。
• His fair dealing earned our confidence.他的诚实的行为获得我们的信任。

7 vegetarian   

n.素食者；adj.素食的

参考例句：

• She got used gradually to the vegetarian diet.她逐渐习惯吃素食。
• I didn't realize you were a vegetarian.我不知道你是个素食者。

8 emissions   

排放物( emission的名词复数 )； 散发物（尤指气体）

参考例句：

• Most scientists accept that climate change is linked to carbon emissions. 大多数科学家都相信气候变化与排放的含碳气体有关。
• Dangerous emissions radiate from plutonium. 危险的辐射物从钚放散出来。