Projects

This project will quantify avoided food waste/loss emissions associated with cold chain services, net of emissions of the equipment needed to refrigerate foods.. The purpose of the project will be to construct a model that can assist with decision-making regarding cold chain deployment in developing countries.

The project will have two primary components:

1. Construction of a generic Excel-based model that estimates the energy requirements and associated changes in food losses for each element in a fully integrated cold chain. The model will be able to compare a food supply chain without access to temperature-controlled environments to one that has either a fully integrated cold chain or individual elements of a cold chain (i.e. access to initial cold storage but no further refrigeration in distribution). The model will be adaptable to parameters associated with different food types, geographies (Southeast Asia, South America, Sub-Saharan Africa, Central Asia/Russia), and type of cold environment (i.e. chilled vs. frozen).

2. In addition to creation of the generic model, the research team will use the model to provide three major “worked examples” to help validate the model and provide a roadmap for how the model can be used. The worked examples will provide hypothetical scenarios to represent real-world considerations and situations that can arise in cold chain deployment. The different worked examples will showcase how the model can be used and the kinds of insights it can provide.