If everyone in the U.S. stopped wasting food, total U.S. carbon emissions would be reduced by 2 percent.

Americans waste a huge amount of food every year (think about the banana you didn’t eat in time, the leftover roast beef that’s still in the fridge, the bread that got moldy). More than a quarter of food gets tossed. 

According to new research from the University of Texas at Austin, the energy embedded in wasted food accounts for 2 percent of total U.S. energy use–accounting for roughly 2 percent of our emissions.  If we all did a better job eating our leftovers, we’d buy less food and we’d save millions of tons of CO2. 

Takeru Kobayashi of Japan sits in exhaustion after downing 44 hot dogs at the annual hot dog eating contest at Coney Island in New York City. Kobayashi, who set a world record of 50 1/2 hot dogs in last years contest, easily won again this year. Chris Hondros/Getty Images