The Hidden Middle Step in Our Food System
Every meal you eat has been through a journey. It starts on a farm and ends on your plate, but there’s a massive invisible stage in between—food manufacturing. This is where raw ingredients are transformed into the products we see on supermarket shelves: wheat into bread, milk into cheese, oranges into juice.
This stage isn’t just important for taste, safety, and convenience—it’s also one of the biggest contributors to food-related emissions. In fact, the food manufacturing industry was valued at $4.7 trillion globally in 2020, yet its environmental impact often overlooked.
So, what exactly is driving emissions in food manufacturing? And more importantly—what can businesses do about it?
The Biggest Emission Sources in Food Manufacturing
1. Processing: the energy cost of transformation
Emissions: 0.6 billion tons of CO₂e
Equivalency: 140 million gasoline-powered cars driven for one year
The transformation of raw ingredients into packaged foods is one of the most energy-intensive steps in food production. Take orange juice as an example:
To make the juice in your fridge, oranges go through nearly 20 mechanical steps—washing, peeling, juice extraction, filtering, pasteurizing, and packaging. Every step requires heat, electricity, and water, most of which still come from fossil fuels.
It’s a necessary process. Without pasteurization and refrigeration, most juices wouldn’t last long enough to reach store shelves. But this transformation comes at a cost, with processing facilities contributing 0.6 billion tons of CO₂ annually.
What Can Be Done to reduce the impact of food processing?
In the past decade, some facilities have switched to electric heating powered by renewables, drastically cutting emissions. Others have adopted energy-efficient equipment that reduces unnecessary heating and cooling cycles.
Want to see where emissions are coming from in your production process? Map your energy-intensive steps and model impact reductions with Nature Preserve’s LCA tool.
2. Packaging: a necessary burden or an opportunity?
Emissions: 1 billion tons of CO₂e
Equivalency: 233 million gasoline-powered cars driven for one year
Packaging plays two critical but conflicting roles in sustainability:
It protects food, extends shelf life, and reduces waste.
It’s a major emissions driver, responsible for 1 billion tons of CO₂ per year.
The material choice makes a huge difference:
Reusable kegs for beer: Just 20g of CO₂ per liter
Recycled glass bottles: 300–750g CO₂ per liter
Glass bottles in landfills: Up to 2,500g CO₂ per liter
Think about that next time you grab a beer—choosing packaging isn’t just a design decision; it’s an emissions decision.
How Can Companies Reduce Packaging Emissions?A growing number of brands are moving toward lightweight packaging, compostable films, and high-recycled-content materials. But many companies still don’t have visibility into the emissions of their packaging choices.
Interested in learning how breweries can reduce their carbon footprint? Read the following article: How Breweries Can Reduce Their Carbon Footprint and Improve Sustainability
3. Transport: not as big of an impact as you might think
Emissions: 0.8 billion tons of CO₂e
Equivalency: 186 million gasoline-powered cars driven for one year
Once food is packaged, it has to get from factories to retailers. And for perishable goods like dairy or meat, it must be kept cold along the way.
At first glance, shipping food worldwide seems like the biggest issue—but here’s the real surprise:
Shipping (by sea) is actually very efficient, using only 10–20 MJ of energy per ton-kilometer.
Trucking is the bigger problem, burning 70–80 MJ per ton-kilometer.
Air freight is the worst offender, consuming 100–200 MJ per ton-kilometer—but it’s rarely used for food.
Despite common misconceptions, transport emissions only account for 1–9% of a food product’s total carbon footprint. The real challenge? Refrigerated transport (cold chain logistics), which increases emissions dramatically.
What Can Be Done to reduce the impact of transportation?
Some companies are cutting emissions by optimizing delivery routes, switching to electric trucks, and investing in more efficient refrigeration.
But food manufacturers can also go beyond transportation itself—by analyzing their supply chain to find lower-emission sourcing options. That’s what Nature Preserve’s supply chain mapping tools help with—giving businesses visibility into Scope 3 emissions and alternative sourcing pathways.
Is transportation really your biggest emissions challenge? Uncover the true impact of your supply chain with Nature Preserve’s supply chain mapping tool.
4. Food waste: the silent emissions giant
Emissions: 6% of global greenhouse gases
Equivalency: 650 million gasoline-powered cars driven for one year
If food waste were a country, it would be the third-largest emitter in the world after China and the U.S. And much of this waste comes from food manufacturing itself—peels, skins, and offcuts that don’t make it into the final product.
One of the biggest examples? Fruit processing. The pulp left over from juicing is often discarded or sent to landfills, where it decomposes and releases methane, a greenhouse gas 25x more potent than CO₂.
How can food manufacturers reduce waste?
Some companies are finding ways to upcycle by-products into new products, like turning fruit peels into fibers or supplements. Others are using better waste-tracking systems to optimize ingredient use.
Where does your waste go? Track waste flows, assess impact allocation, and uncover upcycling opportunities with Nature Preserve, and turn food waste from an emissions problem into a value-added opportunity.
Related Read Article: The Story of Unavoidable Food Waste in Food Manufacturing
How Can You Turn Insight Into Action?
The food industry is entering a new era where sustainability isn’t just about compliance—it’s about competitive advantage. Food manufacturers that measure and manage their emissions will be ahead of both regulations and market demand.
Nature Preserve helps businesses take action by:
✔ Running LCAs to identify high-impact areas
✔ Simulating net-zero roadmaps for packaging, processing, and logistics
✔ Tracking supplier and Scope 3 emissions for transparency and compliance
Measuring emissions is just the beginning. Take the next step with Nature Preserve’s LCAs, Scope 3 tracking, and net-zero simulations.
References
FAQ: How Nature Preserve Helps with LCAs & Emission Reduction
How does Nature Preserve help food processors meet client sustainability demands?
Retailers and B2B Clients are increasingly asking for product-level footprinting. Nature Preserve helps you track, reduce, and communicate your environmental impact, making it easier to meet retailer and B2B sustainability requirements.