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Mapping the Influence of Food Waste in Food Packaging Environmental Performance Assessments: Food Waste and Packaging Environmental Trade-Offs

March 2018
Journal of Industrial Ecology 23(5)

Authors:

University of Michigan

Scrutiny of food packaging environmental impacts has led to a variety of sustainability directives, but has largely focused on the direct impacts of materials. A growing awareness of the impacts of food waste warrants a recalibration of packaging environmental assessment to include the indirect effects due to influences on food waste. In this study, we model 13 food products and their typical packaging formats through a consistent life cycle assessment framework in order to demonstrate the effect of food waste on overall system greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and cumulative energy demand (CED). Starting with food waste rate estimates from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, we calculate the effect on GHG emissions and CED of a hypothetical 10% decrease in food waste rate. This defines a limit for increases in packaging impacts from innovative packaging solutions that will still lead to net system environmental benefits. The ratio of food production to packaging production environmental impact provides a guide to predicting food waste effects on system performance. Based on a survey of the food LCA literature, this ratio for GHG emissions ranges from 0.06 (wine example) to 780 (beef example). High ratios with foods such as cereals, dairy, seafood, and meats suggest greater opportunity for net impact reductions through packaging‐based food waste reduction innovations. While this study is not intended to provide definitive LCAs for the product/package systems modeled, it does illustrate both the importance of considering food waste when comparing packaging alternatives, and the potential for using packaging to reduce overall system impacts by reducing food waste.

System diagram indicating the life cycle stages to be included in this study. Thick arrows represent tages where transport is included. Colors correspond to those in figure 3 and figure S1 in supporting information S1 on the Web.

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Demonstration of the “food to packaging” (FTPGHGE) ratio for a large number and variety of foods and packaging configurations (beyond those identified in table 1 and assessed in this study). See supporting information S1 on the Web for details of the literature review and calculations. The vertical scale is presented as logarithmic in order to compactly show a wide range of values. Red horizontal bars represent average values for each food grouping, and boxes are 95% confidence intervals around the average. Green horizontal bars represent median values for each food grouping. The cases modeled in the current study are shown as orange “x”s for reference. Other foods, packaging configurations, system boundaries, and background data conditions represented in this figure are as reported in the literature and do not reflect the current study.

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Distribution of GHG emissions across cradle‐to‐grave life cycle stages for the food/package combinations in table 1. Values above bars represent total GHG emissions in kg CO2‐eq. (kg consumed)‐1. Note that “edible food waste contribution” includes emissions associated with edible retail‐ and consumer‐level food waste accumulated throughout the life cycle: production, packaging, distribution, retail, refrigeration, and disposal. GHG = greenhouse gas; kg CO2eq. = kilograms of carbon dioxide equivalents.

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Demonstration of the increase in GHG emissions associated with the packaging system (primary, tertiary, and disposal) that would balance a 10% reduction in food waste rate at the retail (blue symbols), consumer (orange symbols), and retail plus consumer (red symbols) level for the food: packaging combinations in table 1. The allowable percent increase in packaging GHG emissions is plotted against FTPGHGE (food production GHG emissions to packaging production GHG emissions, calculated without food waste contributions). Note that the x‐axis is logarithmic merely to display a wide range of values efficiently. GHG = greenhouse gas.

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Demonstration of the increase in nonrenewable CED associated with the packaging system (primary, tertiary, and disposal) that would balance a 10% reduction in food waste rate at the retail (blue symbols), consumer (orange symbols), and retail plus consumer (red symbols) level for the food: packaging combinations in table 1. The allowable percent increase in packaging energy demand is plotted against the FTP ratio (food production energy demand to packaging production energy demand, calculated without food waste contributions). CED = cumulative energy demand.

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RESEARCH AND ANALYSIS

Mapping the Inﬂuence of Food Waste

in Food Packaging Environmental

Performance Assessments

Martin C. Heller ,1Susan E. M. Selke ,2and Gregory A. Keoleian1

1Center for Sustainable Systems, School of Natural Resources and Environment, University of Michigan, Ann

Arbor, MI, USA

2School of Packaging and Center for Packaging Innovation and Sustainability, Michigan State University, East

Lansing, MI, USA

Summary

Scrutiny of food packaging environmental impacts has led to a variety of sustainability

directives, but has largely focused on the direct impacts of materials. A growing awareness

of the impacts of food waste warrants a recalibration of packaging environmental assessment

to include the indirect effects due to inﬂuences on food waste. In this study, we model 13

food products and their typical packaging formats through a consistent life cycle assessment

framework in order to demonstrate the effect of food waste on overall system greenhouse

gas (GHG) emissions and cumulative energy demand (CED). Starting with food waste

rate estimates from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, we calculate the effect on GHG

emissions and CED of a hypothetical 10% decrease in food waste rate. This deﬁnes a

limit for increases in packaging impacts from innovative packaging solutions that will still

lead to net system environmental beneﬁts. The ratio of food production to packaging

production environmental impact provides a guide to predicting food waste effects on

system performance. Based on a sur vey of the food LCA literature, this ratio for GHG

emissions ranges from 0.06 (wine example) to 780 (beef example). High ratios with foods

such as cereals, dairy, seafood, and meats suggest greater opportunity for net impact

reductions through packaging-based food waste reduction innovations. While this study

is not intended to provide deﬁnitive LCAs for the product/package systems modeled, it

does illustrate both the importance of considering food waste when comparing packaging

alternatives, and the potential for using packaging to reduce overall system impacts by

reducing food waste.

Keywords :

food packaging

food waste

greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions

industrial ecology

life cycle assessment (LCA)

life cycle energy analysis

Supporting information is linked

to this article on the JIE website

Introduction

While the modern food industry has concerned itself with

maintaining food safety and quality, the moral imperative of

feeding a rapidly growing population, combined with a ma-

turing recognition of the biophysical planetary limits within

Conﬂict of Interest: The authors declare no conﬂict of interest.

Address correspondence to: Martin C. Heller, University of Michigan, 3012 Dana Building, 440 Church Street, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1041, USA. Email: mcheller@umich.edu;

Web: http://css.umich.edu/person/martin-c-heller

DOI: 10.1111/jiec.12743 Editor managing review: Robert Anex

Volume 23, Number 2

which this food must be supplied, has brought acute focus to

the problem of food waste. The Food and Agriculture Organi-

zation of the United Nations (FAO) estimates that one third of

food produced for human consumption is lost or wasted glob-

ally (Gustavsson et al. 2011). Food produced and not eaten has

an annual carbon footprint of 3.3 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide

480 Journal of Industrial Ecology www.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/jie

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