I'm no locavore, but for an article with the word "math" in the title, the following breakdown seems a bit silly:
Overall, transportation accounts for about 14 percent of the total energy consumed by the American food system.
Other favorite targets of sustainability advocates include the fertilizers and chemicals used in modern farming. But their share of the food system’s energy use is even lower, about 8 percent.
The real energy hog, it turns out, is not industrial agriculture at all, but you and me. Home preparation and storage account for 32 percent of all energy use in our food system, the largest component by far.
Well, fine, but ceteris paribus you've just shown that transportation and fertilization do, in fact, make up a not insignifcant percentage of food production cost. Why would you add in the cost of home storage and preparation, which (presumably) will be the same for everyone?
They're not the same for everyone. If you do your dishes in the sink more often, eat your veggies raw more often, open your refrigerator more often, your energy use might be lower than if you started optimizing for transportation costs instead.
Actually, if you do your dishes in the sink, your water consumption will be four to ten times and your energy consumption up to four times higher than in a modern dishwasher, see table 2 on page 9 of http://linusov.info/wp-content/uploads/2007/09/eedal_03_manu...
Actually possibly worse, since shipped foods are engineered to last longer without spoiling, and they go through a lot more quality control than what you pick up at the market, so the ones that spoil quickly often don't even make it to you.
Overall, transportation accounts for about 14 percent of the total energy consumed by the American food system.
Other favorite targets of sustainability advocates include the fertilizers and chemicals used in modern farming. But their share of the food system’s energy use is even lower, about 8 percent.
The real energy hog, it turns out, is not industrial agriculture at all, but you and me. Home preparation and storage account for 32 percent of all energy use in our food system, the largest component by far.
Well, fine, but ceteris paribus you've just shown that transportation and fertilization do, in fact, make up a not insignifcant percentage of food production cost. Why would you add in the cost of home storage and preparation, which (presumably) will be the same for everyone?