Final answer:
When a consumer eats 1500 J of food energy and uses 15% for new biomass, 225 joules are converted into new biomass.
Step-by-step explanation:
The student asked how many joules of food energy were converted into new biomass when a consumer eats 1500 J of food energy and uses 15 percent of that energy for biomass, with the remainder used for cellular respiration and waste.
To find the answer, we can simply calculate 15% of 1500 J.
0.15 × 1500 J = 225 J
Therefore, 225 joules of the food energy were used to create new biomass.