Washington — U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal likes to come home to Connecticut every weekend, but on weekdays, like many lawmakers, he keeps an apartment with a small refrigerator that he stocks with essentials such as cheese, tuna and chicken salad.

And, like many consumers, he said in a phone interview Wednesday, the Democratic senator from Connecticut has been regularly throwing out food once it reaches the label's expiration date. What he didn't know, he said, is that the expiration date in many cases is only the time when the product reaches the end of its peak quality, not the point at which it becomes dangerous or inedible.

"Right now consumers are confronted with a dizzying array of labels ... a patchwork of piecemeal, often conflicting standards," Blumenthal said during a Washington news conference made available on video.

So Blumenthal, along with U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-Maine, introduced on Wednesday the Food Date Labeling Act, which is intended to reduce consumer confusion about expiration dates, cut the amount of food wasted because it is tossed away unnecessarily and increase the amount of food that is donated to local food pantries and other nonprofits.

The bill, which would be implemented by the U.S. Food and Drug Admininstration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, will create two labeling designations: one that says "best if used by" to indicate the end of peak quality and the other "expires on" that urges no consumption beyond the date listed. Supporters hope to see new labeling standardization by early next year if not before.

Blumenthal said the average family of four wastes about $1,500 every year by throwing out perfectly good food and the nation as a whole annually tosses some $165 billion of edible products into the trash. In addition, said advocates of the legislation, 20 states have laws discouraging the donation of food that has passed its expiration date, despite evidence that such regulations are unnecessary because the food is safe.

"Right now there is mass consumer confusion ... a lot of money and food simply wasted," Blumenthal said during the news conference.

Food manufacturers in the past may have opposed standardized food labeling thinking that consumers would simply buy more products, Blumenthal said, but he has lined up some of the top companies in the world, including Campbell Soup Co. and Nestle USA, in support of his legislation.

"Hallelujah, consumers are finally going to understand what code dates are and what they are not," said Steve Armstrong, chief law food law counsel for Campbell Soup. "It's going to help educate consumers.... It's going to create a safe harbor for donation."

Emily Broad Leib, director of the Harvard Food Law and Policy Clinic, said studies have shown that 84 percent of consumers ditch food that has passed its expiration date. And this despite the fact that an estimated 50 million Americans face hunger issues every year, according to government reports.

Pete Pearson, director of food waste for the World Wildlife Fund, said during the news conference that food waste is a huge drain on the environment.

"Everything we eat has an impact on the planet," he said. "It's food production, it's agriculture that has caused the most dramatic loss of biodiversity on earth."

But Pingree, the Maine Democrat who co-sponsored the legislation with Blumenthal, noted a more common thread of interest in food labeling, jokingly mentioning that the pair had once considered calling the bill the Domestic Harmony Act of 2016.

"Almost everybody has had a domestic argument about this," she said in the conference, adding in a statement: "It's time to settle that argument, end the confusion and stop throwing away perfectly good food."

l.howard@theday.com