Green Cleaning and Food Service

Green cleaning is cleaning for health without harming the environment. In food service, as in all areas of a school, meeting stringent public health and sanitation requirements is top priority. Enacting a green cleaning program means using environmentally preferable products and procedures to achieve that goal. Health and safety are never compromised.

The following steps offer guidelines for addressing the special product and sanitation needs of food service when initiating a green cleaning program. Remember that transitioning to green cleaning for food service is not an all or nothing process - a few small changes at a time can have significant benefits. As always, check to ensure any cleaning procedure changes are consistent with local health regulations before enacting.

Step Four: Use Green Paper and Plastic (Consumables)

Schools can save money and resources by purchasing environmentally preferable consumable supplies for food services areas. For information on choosing paper towels, napkins, janitorial wipes, and trash can liners, visit Paper and Plastic Products and Choose Green Paper and Plastic Products.

Food Service Ware

One area where we can make difference in this area is in consumables, including disposable plates, trays and utensils. Studies have shown that the production and use of reusable ware in comparison to disposable ware has significant benefits for the environment and school district budgets. For example, using reusable plastic trays and silverware is preferable to disposable Styrofoam trays and plasticware. This can reduce food service operating costs and has environmental benefits including:

• requires fewer nonrenewable resources to produce
• uses significantly less energy
• contributes less to global warming
• generates lower levels of toxic chemicals during production, use and disposal
• reduces solid waste

While reusable wares are the best choice for the environment, biobased consumable wares offer a more environmentally beneficial choice to traditional petroleum-based wares. Biobased food service wares are made from various renewable resources such as corn, soy, sugar cane waste and perennial grasses.

All biobased products have some impacts on the environment. The production, use, and disposal of the products all make an impact, depending on the methods used to produce and harvest the renewable materials, the toxicity, and the persistence of chemical additives used. Not all biobased products are equally preferable. Products created with sustainable attributes in mind will have a smaller impact on the environment. However, biobased products are environmentally preferable to traditional disposable petroleum based wares.

The chart below summarizes the relative environmental preferability of various food service wares.

	Reusable Food Service Ware	Reusable food service ware requires far fewer material resources, uses much less energy, and generates much lower levels of air and water pollutants and less solid waste in its production, use and disposal than disposable products.
	Biobased Products	Biobased disposables have emerged as an alternative to traditional products. These products also have an environmental advantage if they are composted.
	Fossil Fuel-based Disposable Products	The use of fossil fuel-based plastic food ware has serious environmental and public health ramifications that make them undesirable for a green cleaning program that has the goal of promoting health.

Learn more about the environmental implications of food service products in the report: "Choosing Environmentally Preferable Food Service Ware: Reusable and Sustainable Biobased Products" by Health Care Without Harm in the Documents and Links section.

Waste Free Lunch
Food service areas are ideal places to begin waste reduction and recycling programs. Many schools have adopted waste-free lunch days, in which students are challenged to bring in lunches completely recyclable, reusable, or compostable. Schools with gardens can take advantage of vegetable and fruit scraps to start a composting program, or, if near a farming community, schools can arrange a food composting program with local farmers. Another growing trend in school recycling is teaching students to create biodiesel fuel from cooking oil waste.

EPA has developed an excellent set of tools to promote waste free lunch days at your schools. Check out the Documents and Links section and view the posters, sample letters and fact sheets about creating your waste free lunch.