The potential for saving food waste by lowering home refrigerator temperatures

A significant proportion of the 4.4 million tonnes of avoidable household food and drink thrown away each year in the UK comprises products that require, or benefit from, refrigerated storage e.g. meat and fish, dairy products, most fruit and vegetables. In some consumers’ homes, refrigerated foods are kept in less than optimal conditions e.g. not in the refrigerator, ‘unwrapped’ or at refrigerator temperatures above 5oC. This can lead to rapid food spoilage, and also to food safety risks. Storage in the refrigerator at temperatures below 5oC could extend the storage life of many of these foods, giving greater opportunity for their consumption before they reach the end of their acceptable life. This paper presents results from research funded by WRAP to determine relationships between chilled storage temperature and published storage lives of typical food products. The potential reductions in food waste which might result from extended storage lives if refrigerator temperatures were lowered to 4°C rather than the UK average of 7°C (WRAP, 2010) are estimated. To be balanced against these savings however is the increased energy consumption which results from running refrigerators at lower temperatures, and results from an experimental assessment of the impact of lowering fridge temperatures on energy consumption are presented. The costs and associated carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) emissions associated with the saved waste and the increased energy are compared.