Greek Yogurt By-product Poses Major Threat to Environment

While Greek yogurt may be healthier for people than regular yogurt, it’s certainly not better for the Earth, according to a report by Modern Farmer.

For every three or four ounces of milk, the site reports, companies manufacturing the popular dairy product only produce one ounce of yogurt; the rest of it becomes acid whey, a runny waste product that is so toxic it’s illegal to dump.

The way it works has to do with the way its “strained” or, more accurately, the way mechanical separators using centrifugal force remove the whey, which, when it’s done, is roughly as acidic as orange juice and made of water, lactose, some minerals and a very small amount of proteins.

And with the total market for Greek yogurt having reached $2 billion, according to The New York Times, the amount of waste is only growing.

At this point, according to Modern Farmer, there are no industry-wide statistics on where all the by-product s going, though one leading producer called Chobani says that more than 70 percent is used as a supplement for livestock.

However, as dairy scientist Dave Barbano at Cornell University told the site, there may be another consumer – babies.

“Because the Greek yogurt production grew so rapidly, no one really had the time to step back and look at the other viable options,” he said.
However, he believes the protein in the whey may be used in infant formula and is currently researching a way to cost-effectively remove the protein from the whey.

Meanwhile, scientists at the Center for Dairy Research at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, have been trying for almost a year to remove the edible-grade lactose out of acid whey for use in things like icing.

“It’s kind of like oil refining: from crude oil you get gas and diesel and other products,” Dean Sommer, a food technologist at the center, told Modern Farmer. “This is the same concept. You figure out what’s in there and how to grab it and get value out of it.”

Furthermore, a farm in upstate New York has found another use for the lactose: converting it into methane that can be used to generate electricity.

However, whether these methods will be either ultimately successful in the case of the first two or, in the case of all three, able to absorb the tens of millions of gallons being produced is unclear.

In the meantime, companies are trying to avoid a catastrophe like the one that occurred in 2008 when Miverva Cheese Factory released acid whey into Sandy Creek, Ohio, effectively depleting oxygen levels long enough to kill more than 5,000 fish along a 1.5 mile stretch.

To read the full report by Modern Farmer, click here.