The HANPP Collection: Human Appropriation of Net Primary Productivity (HANPP) by Country and Product contains tabular data on carbon-equivalents of consumption by country and by type of product. The data were compiled from national-level FAO statistics on consumption of products such as vegetables, meat, paper, and wood. HANPP represents the amount of carbon required to derive food and fibre products consumed by humans including organic matter that is lost during harvesting and processing. Net primary productivity (NPP), the net amount of solar energy converted to plant organic matter through photosynthesis, can be measured in units of elemental carbon and represents the primary food energy source for the world's ecosystems. These tabular data were used to allocate country level NPP consumption to a spatial surface of NPP consumption (Global Patterns in Human Appropriation of Net Primary Productivity), which is part of this collection.
The project tested the concept for combining waste degradation and food production in a single reactor or column, i.e., a "Cow-in-a-Column". The inputs could include space mission solid wastes, such as inedible plant biomass (largely cellulose), while the processor consisted of serial columns of immobilized microbes to first degrade the wastes and then produce high value products, such as milk fat and/or protein. The concept also could be applied to produce biofuels such as methane, biodiesel, or solvents. The project demonstrated the feasibility of the concept but requires further testing to optimize the performance.