The climate- and energy-efficient school kitchen

Peer reviewed / Manuscript (original) submitted: 03. Juni 2020 / Revision accepted: 15. January 2021

Making school meals climate friendly and child friendly

Introduction

Achieving greenhouse gas neutrality by 2050: this is the declared aim of the German Climate Action Plan 2050 [1]. To achieve this, the food system will need to be overhauled in order to drastically reduce the greenhouse gas emissions (GHG emissions) that it produces (currently it accounts for 15% of GHG emissions) while still ensuring that high-quality food is available [1–6]. In 2017/18, around 69% of German schools were operating on a full-day basis and they catered for around 3.2 million pupils [7] — and this trend is rising. The pandemic in 2020 and 2021 has led to some ups and downs in the business of school catering. As a consequence, smaller catering companies were forced to close down, meaning that a redistribution process took place: the orders previously dealt with by the small companies are now being dealt with by the large companies in the industry. It remains to be seen whether this development will have a positive or negative effect on GHG emissions.

The climate goals are now increasingly presenting schools with a challenge: they need to provide climate-friendly meals that are healthy, child friendly and affordable, in line with the public health nutrition perspective [8, 9]. Due to Germany’s federal educational structure, there are no uniform guidelines for the implementation of school catering [8, 10], which makes such a project more difficult. The German Nutrition Society (DGE) Quality Standards [11] offer some guidance in this regard. Approaches to sustainable nutrition in commercial kitchens have been developed in the context of various research projects, such as Große Küche auf kleiner Flamme, Essen in Hessen, SUKI, Bio kann Jeder and NAHGAST. These projects have focused primarily on adapting menus and avoiding food waste.

Abstract

In Germany, the consumer sector “food” is responsible for around 15% of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG). Due to the high demand for food outside the home, changes in this area have the potential to significantly boost climate-efficient nutrition, and this includes changes in school kitchens. Currently, about 264 kg of GHG emissions per year are attributable to the food served to each school child who has school lunch year-round.
Therefore, the project “Climate and Energy Efficient Cooking in Schools” (“Klima- und Energieeffiziente Küche in Schulen” or KEEKS for short) sought to determine the status quo in the kitchens of 22 all-day schools serving a total of 5,000 lunches per day. This was done by taking energy measurements and analyzing the equipment, technology and processes used in the kitchens, and by interviewing kitchen managers using guided interviews. Greenhouse gas emissions arising from menus and kitchen processes were calculated, potential savings were identified, and recommendations for action were developed and tested. The most effective measures—the reduction and substitution of meat and meat products and the establishment of efficient waste management systems—save around 10% of a school kitchen’s greenhouse gas emissions. The recommendations that have been developed can support kitchen staff in designing a climate-friendly, child-friendly, healthy and affordable menu in the school kitchen.

Keywords: School meals, climate efficiency, sustainability, greenhouse gas emissions, eating outside the home

Full text PDF (free version)

Online supplement

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/legalcode