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LeanPath® proudly announces the introduction of WasteLOGGER, a software solution for food waste tracking that helps any restaurant, hotel, caterer, or foodservice operation prevent, minimize and avoid pre-consumer food waste (which includes overproduction, spoilage, expiration, trim waste). The software runs on existing computers and does not require specialized tracking equipment. WasteLOGGER was previewed at the 2010 National Restaurant Show in Chicago and will be available commercially in Summer 2010.

Food Waste Tracking: Best Practice in Waste Prevention

Food waste management is a core element of any strategy for sustainable foodservice operations and represents a significant opportunity to enhance efficiency and save resources.

“The EPA’s food waste management hierarchy prioritizes source reduction as the critical first step and best practice in food waste management” says Andrew Shakman, President and Co-Founder of LeanPath, Inc. “And the key to source reduction is daily food waste tracking – without daily information you have no way to diagnose food waste, create awareness, or begin to measure progress.”

Green recognition and certification programs (including the NRA’s Greener Restaurants Program and Green Seal’s GS-46 Standard for Green Restaurant and Foodservice Operations) both identify food waste auditing and tracking as a core best practice in any waste management effort.

Food waste is one of the most expensive hidden costs in any restaurant and foodservice operation. Food waste tracking is the simple, easy, and effective antidote. By tracking waste daily, operators can save 2-4%+ on food purchases, while also saving on disposal and labor costs and operating greener facilities.

LeanPath’s Family of Food Waste Tracking Solutions:

For Volume Foodservice & Hospitality: The patented ValuWaste® Automated System, a rugged touch-screen terminal and bench scale used to track food waste 24-7 in volume foodservice operations.

For Other Restaurants & Foodservice: LeanPath WasteLOGGER, a PC-based software tool to track food waste in small to medium-sized restaurant and foodservice operations as well as mobile catering operations, without the need for specialized tracking equipment.

About LeanPath, Inc.

Founded in 2004, LeanPath pioneered food waste tracking and offers several product solutions. Together, LeanPath WasteLOGGER and the ValuWaste System allow restaurants and foodservice operations of all sizes to select the right tools to meet their tracking and auditing needs for food waste.Contact: LeanPath, Inc. (www.leanpath.com) is a technology company providing food waste tracking systems to the restaurant and foodservice industry. LeanPath partners with leading foodservice organizations at sites in more than 24 U.S. states with customers including ARAMARK, Sodexo, Compass Group, and MGM Mirage. For additional information about LeanPath or its products contact the company by e-mail at info@leanpath.com or by phone at (877) 620-6512.

To view the press release from the LeanPath website:  http://www.leanpath.com/releases.shtml
Contact: Carolyn Burleigh, Carolyn.Burleigh@gmail.com or 503/381-1095

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They need to get the calculations right or risk a culinary disaster due to over/under production, over/under purchasing or quality problems.

Bryan  Bowers, the production manager with ARAMARK  at Bayhealth Kent General Hospital in Dover, Delaware recently recommened the following site for unit-of-measure conversions:  check it out and see how a simple, free web resource like this can help you improve your accuracy versus hand-held calculations.

Another important resource is the Book of Yields.  This incredibly handy reference book includes information on most weight-to-volume conversions and other factors effecting yields.  You can find it online.

Get the Book of Yields and a good web conversion tool and you will be on your way to greater accuracy.  Or better yet:  invest in an automated food production system PLUS a food waste tracking system from LeanPath.

Getting your math right with recipe scaling, purchasing, and yield calculations will really help you avoid food waste!

Think of all the glasses of drinking water we pour for diners that never touch them, or all the plastic water bottles we sell, or the infinite number of water pitchers we set-up for conference events.  The bottom-line is:  foodservice wastes lots of drinking water.  

The impacts are three-fold:

• When we empty unused glasses and pitchers, we waste the drinking water itself, which has become an increasingly scarce resource .
• When we wash permanent ware such as glasses and pitchers, we waste energy, water, and labor.
• We throw away a massive volume of single-use  plastic water containers.

How can we do better? 

Three solutions:

• In cafeteria/buffet environments, place “plumbed-in” drinking water dispensers in a prominent location  and offer only reusable cups (disposable cups can be available upon request). Merchandise this water so it’s an attractive option for patrons, rather than an afterthought.  Yes, you will lose some bottled water sales but that product category is already under siege due to the bottle waste.  Also, you can’t just eliminate water bottles outright because it dimishes customer choice, which is never a good thing.  We just need to have an attractive non-bottled option.
• In conference centers and restaurants, consider offering bottled water in glass reusable bottles, and/or offer water on request.  Companies such as Aquahealth and Natura offer some very interesting solutions, including sparking and flat options.  You wash your own bottles and fill only what you need for each table, rather than for individual diners or conference participants.  Bottles which aren’t touched aren’t wasted.  This approach adds value to water (it looks better in a custom branded bottle than any glass or pitcher) and it allows you to limit the water you discard, the warewashing, and the bottle waste.
• Make sure your staff is only drinking water from reusable tumblers or glasses.

Give water some thought – it’s increasingly expensive and its packaging implications stretch far and wide.   Trust that your efforts will add up to much more than a drop in the bucket!

My response was to look at the waste hierarchy first and make sure she has programs in place for each level of the hierarchy:

EPA Food Waste Hierarchy

Starting at the top:

1. Reduction:  Implement a food waste tracking program.  Using either manual processes or automated tools such as those we provide at LeanPath, start tracking your food waste.  Without this measurement and feedback step, you cannot know where to focus or if you’re successfully preventing and minimizing waste at the source.

2. Reuse.  Establish at least one good food donation partnership.  Find one or more agencies that will take leftover, safe and edible food.   Set-up processes for assessing food for donation and potential and, as a bonus, use this as an occasion to emphasize food safety principles to the team.  If you can’t find a way to feed people, then see if you can find a farmer who can use food to feed animals.

3.  Industrial Uses.  Find a bio-diesel producer who will purchase or at least receive your yellow grease.

4.  Composting.  With all the food that is left after 1-3, our goal is simple:  Make sure it gets diverted so it does not go into a landfill!   So what are the options (not in any ranked order)?

• Compost off-site with a commercial food waste composter, if one exists in your area.
• Compost on-site, if space and labor allows.
• Use a garbage disposer to send food waste for treatment and energy/fertilizer use at a Waste Water Treatment plant.
• Dehydrate the waste using a device such as the Somat ecorect.
• Use a biodigester such as the Orca to turn the food waste into a nutrient-rich water effluent on-site.

There is a lot of nuance in selecting from each of these options and you need to understand the full lifecycle of how each impacts the environment and costs.  But everyone of these solutions is preferable to dumping food waste into a landfill.

5. Disposal.  Try to reduce the volume and/or weight of the remaining waste, if any remains, before sending it to the landfill.  There are a number of options to do this:

• Pulpers
• Scrap collectors
• Shredders

I wish this were easier for operators to navigate, but it’s a rapidly changing topic and there are new options and alternatives becoming available.  That said, the waste hierarchy is a great guide to use as you think through these issues.

Interestingly, they have concluded that use of garbage disposers  to handle food waste provides “positive impacts” on their system and they describe why right here (PDF)in their summer newsletter.

Over the years, garbage disposers have received plenty of negative publicity and been restricted in some communities.  In conversations with operators, I sometimes hear concerns about disposers leading to clogged sewer systems or using too much water.  Others feel disposers are diverting food waste from “more productive” uses such as composting.

I’ve dug into this issue more deeply recently, reading some of the independent environmental research on food waste disposers and speaking with the manufacturers themselves, including InSinkErator and Salvajor.

The manufacturers make the argument that disposers are a very competitive environmental alternative to composting and a better solution than any landfill option.  The basis of their argument is that:

• Food waste is already 70% water.  It’s natural to use the municipal sewer system to transport food waste.
• Disposers cut the GHG emissions associated with trucking food waste.  They limit methane emissions that occur during storage and transportation of food waste.  They also save money by avoiding disposal costs.
• The food waste can be processed at the waste water treatment plant (WWTP) in a way that converts it to electricity and heat.   The residual bio-solids can be further processed into fertilizer.
• This process produces somewhat equivalent fertilizer benefits when compared to composting, plus it produces energy.
• Disposers offer better sanitation and convenience for operators and are affordable to install.
• Disposers use very limited amounts of electrical power.
• Food waste is not a major contributor to FOG (fats, oils, and greases) build-ups in sewer lines.  Most data points to FOG problems occurring when yellow grease is poured into the sewage system rather than FOG forming from general food waste.

On the negative side, critics of food waste disposers argue:

• Disposers require water to transport food waste, and water is an increasingly scarce resource in many areas.
• Some waste water treatment plants are overburdened with organics and cannot handle the extra load, leading to water quality issues.
• About 40% of the waste water volume in the US will not flow through a plant that can convert the food waste to energy.
• Bio-solids can contain pharmaceutical waste, metals and other contaminants that make it less attractive as a fertilizer than straight compost.
• Disposers cannot be used with heavy volumes of paper.

As with most things, the analysis is not black and white.  A foodservice operator needs to start by determining whether local codes restrict his or her use of disposers.  If there are no restrictions, then a disposer should be considered as a viable alternative.

I still have more to investigate on this topic, but my present view is that disposers have received an unfair rap and deserve a close second look.

Of course, reducing waste at the source is the best thing that can be done about food waste.  However, since it’s not possible to reduce 100% of all food waste, diversion alternatives play an important role.

This is where disposers may be “greener” may make a lot of sense.  For example, the carbon footprint associated with hauling food waste is significant and it strikes me as a big deal to avoid that impact.  And the energy production potential from waste-to-energy processes at WWTP’s is exactly the type of financial resource that makes a process such as this viable over the long term.  Not to mention, disposers are easy for employees to use and keep the kitchen clean.

At this point, I recommend operators think of disposers as a valid alternative to composting, depending on the specifics of their operation, municipality, and water resources.

I look forward to following this topic over time and welcome all feedback.

The folks at Energy Star have created a screening tool to estimate how efficiently a building uses energy.  After using this tool and evaluating energy use, you receive an Energy Performance Rating from 1-100, with 75-100 being the most energy efficient.  Learn more about getting an Energy Performance Rating at www.energystar.gov .  This rating can help you to identify which areas or appliances are energy wasters so you can assess performance and identify those areas that offer the best opportunities for improvement.

While you are at the Energy Star website, check out other great programs like Tax Credits for Energy efficiency or   Recycling Appliances .  Properly recycling electric products permanently removes them from the electric grid, conserves resources, and makes room for more energy-efficient models.

The problem?  Many locales do not have a commercial composting facility nearby.  So are foodservice operators in these regions out of luck?  Absolutely not. 

There are several solutions available for on-site composting when an off-site solution is not available or preferred:

• Aerobic Biodigesters.  These break down food waste and produce only water and CO2 (much less potent than methane).  Greenguard Associates offers a machine called the ORCA Green.  Another firm is Waste to Water Environmental, which also offers an aerobic biodigester.                                                                              
• Waste Dehydrators/Decomposters.  These units dehydrate waste, reducing its volume up to 90%.  They do not biologically change the waste, however, so the output is not compost.   Somat markets the Ecorect Dehydrator in the US and says the end-product is not compost but rather should be called “Sterile Biomass”:

This unit dehydrates and macerates food waste producing a mulch-like end product that is suitable for use as a soil amendment. The by-product can be considered a “Sterile Biomass” since it has been sterilized by 180 degree temperatures for several hours. The by-product will complete the composting process when introduced into soil and rehydrated. 

The bottom-line is there are emerging on-site composting/dehydration options available.   In addition to environmental benefits, these systems typically yield cost savings and compelling ROI by avoiding and reducing hauling and landfill costs.

“Waste has become a political and community issue as well as a cost concern.”

This is true and perhaps no topic is more politically sensitive than how foodservice operations dispose of waste that they cannot first reduce or otherwise divert.   

In this article, Bendall discussess the differences between waste disposers, pulpers and scrap collectors and describes the scenarios where each makes sense.   The bottom line is that different solutions offer varying levels of impact on the amount of labor needed to handle waste, on disposal costs, on odors & hazards, and on the amount of water and energy required by the process.  

In my view, disposers may be a better solution, environmentally and financially, than many anticipate (provided they are supported in your municipality!).    As Bendall notes, pulpers perform the same function as disposers in areas where disposers aren’t allowed or advisable, and often do so with more efficient use of water.   Finally, scrap collectors also reduce labor and waste volume in situations where disposers aren’t allowed and a pulping system may be too expensive.    I recommend you read the article to get the full story…