8 Waste, Recyclables, and Reuseable Materials

Food processing industry around the world is making serious efforts to minimize by-products, compost organic waste, recycle processing and packaging materials, and save energy and water. The three R’s of waste management – Reduce, Reuse and Recycle – can help food manufacturers in reducing the amount of waste sent to landfill and reusing waste.

EPA’s Food Recovery Hierarchy

The United States Environmental Protection Agency has developed a prioritized list of what can be done with unused food product.  It is represented by this triangle, with the best solution towards the top of the triangle.

The top levels of the hierarchy are the best ways to prevent and divert wasted food because they create the most benefits for the environment, society and the economy.

Source Reduction

Everyone creates wasted food, but it is just as simple to not create it. Both businesses and individuals can learn to effectively prevent the flow of wasted food by taking simple steps such as making grocery lists, inventorying supplies, and buying less.

Benefits

• Prevent pollution related to food production, such as fertilizers and pesticides, and save energy associated with growing, preparing, and transporting food.
• Reduce methane emissions from landfills.  Methane is a greenhouse gas.
• Save money by buying only what is needed.
• Save labor costs through more efficient handling, preparation, and storage of food that will actually be used.

Reduce Wasted Food by Feeding Hungry People

Redistributing food to feed people is the second tier. EPA estimates that in 2018, about 63 million tons of wasted food were generated in the United States¹. While Americans dispose of millions of tons of food, the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that 10.5 percent of American households – about 13.7 million households – had difficulty providing enough food for all their members due to a lack of resources at some time during 2019.² In many cases, the food tossed into our nation’s landfills is wholesome, edible food.

We can be leaders in our communities by collecting unspoiled, healthy food and donating it to our neighbors in need. By donating food, we’re feeding people, not landfills, supporting local communities, and saving all the resources that went into producing that food from going to waste.

Large manufacturers, supermarket chains, wholesalers, farmers, food brokers, and organized community food drives typically give food to food banks. Restaurants, caterers, corporate dining rooms, hotels, and other food establishments promptly distribute perishable and prepared foods to hungry people in their communities. Many food banks and food rescue organizations will pick up food donations free of charge, saving donors time and money.

1. United States Environmental Protection Agency, Food: Material-Specific Data.
2. United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, Household Food Security in the United States 2019EXITEXIT EPA WEBSITE.

Reduce Wasted Food by Feeding Animals

Feeding Animals is the third tier of EPA’s Food Recovery Hierarchy. Farmers have been doing this for centuries. With proper and safe handling, anyone can donate food scraps to animals. Food scraps for animals can save farmers and companies money. It is often cheaper to feed animals food scraps rather than having them hauled to a landfill. Companies can also donate extra food to zoos or producers that make animal or pet food. There are many opportunities to feed animals, help the environment and reduce costs.

Industrial Uses for Wasted Food

The fourth tier of EPA’s Food Recovery Hierarchy is industrial uses. Food can be used to not only feed people and animals, but also power your car or generator. There is increasing interest in finding effective means to obtain biofuel and bio-products from wasted food. These options aim to alleviate some of the environmental and economic issues associated with wasted food while increasing the use of alternative energy sources.

Anaerobic Digestion

Anaerobic digestion is a process where microorganisms break down organic materials, such as food scraps, manure, and sewage sludge. This is done in the absence of oxygen. Recycling wasted food through anaerobic digestion produces biogas and a soil amendment (fertilizer), two valuable products.

Wasted food can be processed at facilities specifically designed to digest the organic portion of municipal solid waste. It can also be co-digested at wastewater treatment plants and manure digesters.

What are industrial uses of fats, oil, and grease?

Liquid fats and solid meat products are materials that should not be sent to landfills or disposed of in the sanitary sewer system. Fats, oils, and grease can clog pipes and pumps both in the public sewer lines as well as in wastewater treatment facilities. This prevents combined sewer overflows, which protects water quality and lowers bills. Fats, oil and grease should be sent to the rendering industry to be made into another product, converted to biofuels, or sent to an anaerobic digester.

• Rendering – Liquid fats and solid meat products can be used as raw materials in the rendering industry, which converts them into animal food, cosmetics, soap, and other products. Many companies will provide storage barrels and free pick-up service.
• Biodiesel – Fats, oils and grease are collected and converted by local manufacturers into environmentally friendly biodiesel fuel. Biodiesel is an alternative fuel produced from renewable resources such as virgin oils (soybean, canola, palm), waste cooking oil, or other biowaste feedstock. Biodiesel significantly reduces greenhouse gases, sulfur dioxide in air emissions, and asthma-causing soot. Along with creating less pollution, biodiesel is simple to use, biodegradable and nontoxic.
• Anaerobic Digestion – Fats, oil and grease can be added to anaerobic digesters at wastewater treatment plants to generate renewable energy in the form of biogas.

Composting

Composting is the fifth tier. Even when all actions have been taken to use your wasted food, certain inedible parts will still remain and can be turned into compost to feed and nourish the soil. Like yard waste, food waste scraps can also be composted. Composting these wastes creates a product that can be used to help improve soils, grow the next generation of crops, and improve water quality. EPA estimates that in 2018, 2.6 million tons of food (4.1 percent of wasted food) was composted. In 2018, Americans recovered over 69 million tons of MSW through recycling, and almost 25 million tons through composting. This is 1.16 pounds per person per day for recycling and 0.42 pounds per person per day for composting. Food composting curbside collection programs served 6.1 million households in 2017, the most recent year for which information is available.

What is Compost?

Gardeners and farmers add compost to soil to improve its physical properties. They may even use compost instead of soil to grow plants. Mature compost is a stable material with a content called humus that is dark brown or black and has a soil-like, earthy smell.

Compost is created by:

• Combining organic wastes, such as wasted food, yard trimmings, and manures, in the right ratios into piles, rows, or vessels.
• Adding bulking agents such as wood chips, as necessary to accelerate the breakdown of organic materials; and
• Allowing the finished material to fully stabilize and mature through a curing process.

Mature compost is created using high temperatures to destroy pathogens and weed seeds that natural decomposition does not destroy.

Benefits of Composting

There are a number of benefits to compost that not everyone is aware of. Some examples are listed below:

• Organic waste in landfills generates, methane, a potent greenhouse gas. By composting wasted food and other organics, methane emissions are significantly reduced.
• Compost reduces and in some cases eliminates the need for chemical fertilizers.
• Compost promotes higher yields of agricultural crops.
• Compost can help aid reforestation, wetlands restoration, and habitat revitalization efforts by improving contaminated, compacted, and marginal soils.
• Compost can be used to remediate soils contaminated by hazardous waste in a cost effective manner.
• Compost can provide cost savings over conventional soil, water and air pollution remediation technologies, where applicable.
• Compost enhances water retention in soils.
• Compost provides carbon sequestration.

Landfill / Incineration

Sending waste to the landfill should be the last resort for disposal.  It takes up limited room in landfills, and causes the release of greenhouse gas.

References

Zafar, Salman, “Waste Management in the Food Processing Industry,” September 4, 2022.  Accessed from https://www.bioenergyconsult.com/waste-management-in-food-processing-industry/ on September 16, 2022.

United States Environmental Protection Agency, “Food Recovery Hierarchy”.  Accessed at https://www.epa.gov/sustainable-management-food/food-recovery-hierarchy on September 16, 2022.