The Sustainable Shift Drink

I’m often making recommendations to restaurant owners that they install high-efficiency (low-flow) pre-rinse spray valves at their dish sink. I’ve seen various types and have had many sites install the units, but with mixed reactions. Some people say they love them, others say they don’t see a difference from their previous unit, and a few other wind up telling that they had to put their old one back in because the low-flow didn’t work. Typically they say it took too long to rinse off dishes, which seems odd to me because the Food Service Technology Center has done extensive research on pre-rinse spray valves that proved otherwise. Not that they operators where wrong, but maybe they just have bad water pressure.

So, with all the back and forth I’ve seen with the sprayers I’m curious what others have experienced. Have you installed a 1.0 gpm or under sprayer? What kind did you buy? How did you like it? Did the dishwashers complain, praise it or not even notice? Did you see a difference on your water or natural gas bill?

Let me know in the comments or via the contact page and I’ll compile the results into a user review post.

 

Tags: pre-rinse sprayer, water efficiency
Posted in Equipment, Water | 2 Comments »

1. Start-up, Shutdown Schedules
Not everything needs to be turned on right away when the first cook arrives. Equipment start-up schedules similar to just-in-time ordering saves energy with no investment.

2. Low flow aerators
These are potentially one of the lowest priced efficiency measures a restaurant can buy. Aerators range from .50 to a several dollars and return the investment almost instantly.

3. Pre-rinse Sprayers
At about $60, these devices pay for themselves in about a week depending on your usage and prior sprayer. Some of the newest units on the market use as little as .65 gallons per minute compared to the old units that use around 3.5 gpm. New regulations require all pre-rinse sprayers to use no more than 1.6 gpm so go as low as you can find.

4. Turbo Pots
Research from the Food Service Technology Center shows that Turbo Pots use about half as much energy to boil a pot of water compared to a standard pot. If you have a pot of water boiling all day in your kitchen these pots are a must have.

5. Thawing Meats
A little bit of organization and scheduling could save many restaurants thousands of gallons of water and hundreds of dollars a year. If you must thaw meats with running water make sure the faucet has a low-flow aerator, and turn the flow down to just enough to keep water flowing across the product – not full blast.

6. CFLs
They are simple and almost old school at this point, but CFLs save a lot of money. Today’s CFLs are cheap and high quality, but don’t buy the cheapest ones you can find. You get what you pay for. Use them in hoods, storage areas, offices, back halls and walk-in coolers.

7. Training
All the green gadgets and gizmos in the world don’t save money unless the users are using them correctly. Moreover, training staff to be conscious about the resources they are using will go much further than any piece of energy efficient equipment.

8. Recycling
Even restaurants that currently recycle should audit their garbage once in a while. More than likely, recyclables are being thrown away and potentially costing the business extra hauling fees. Recycling is a simple task, and can cut a garbage bill in half if the restaurant is not currently taking part in the practice.

9. Composting
Food waste makes up something around 50% of the volume and 75% of the weight of most full service restaurants. Implementing a composting program can be a little more involved, but like recycling it soon becomes second nature to the staff.

10. Food Waste Tracking
Before starting a composting program, start tracking the restaurant’s food waste, and make changes to reduce that waste. Whether through simple paper logs or more complex digital systems like Leanpath, food waste tracking helps chefs and management actualize their waste and make adjustments to par lists, menus or schedules.

Tags: aerators, composting, energy efficiency, food waste, Recycling, Waste Reduction, water efficiency
Posted in Recycling, Waste Reduction, Water | No Comments »

I’m not sure what prompted the sudden surge, but there have been three different reports (one, two, three) published lately on the green awareness of foodservice operators. Two of the reports are from England and the third is from the US. The reports analyzed the perceptions and practices of restaurant owners and managers in regards to sustainability. The reports surveyed a wide range of restaurants from “Mom and Pop” diners to billion dollar multinational franchises and food product manufacturers. The affirming outcome of the studies is that restaurants are very interested in sustainability though they sometimes don’t practice it or know how to practice it. That bodes well for myself and all the suppliers and vendors offering green products, but signifies that we have a challenge ahead of us.

For me, it is great to see that people are getting it. For instance, 94% of respondents in the American study said they would invest in technologies that reduce their energy consumption.

Efficiency is and should be a major goal in sustainability initiatives, but I am little disappointed to see water conservation a distant thought to many questioned in the study. Energy is always in the media and minds of many, but one way or another we can produce endless amounts of energy. We will never run out of energy, maybe oil but not energy. Alternatively, water is the single most important finite resource on the Earth, and fortunately for the restaurant industry water conservation is one of the simplest and most cost effective green measures.

The major barrier to sustainability becoming second nature seems to be the perception that anything green means spending money – lots of money. On the contrary, many green options for restaurants come from simple changes in practices and procedures that cost little to nothing. Even with expensive upgrades the long-term savings in energy, water or waste hauling cost always make the investment worthwhile. The restaurant business is an industry to single digit profits, but the industry as a whole needed to see the light that pitching pennies today loses them dollar tomorrow.

All the studies show a great trend for our industry. We are moving in the right direction of acknowledging sustainable operations, but many of us still need a little prodding to get the ball rolling. If you or your company needs a kick in the pants to get on the right track, give me a call and I’ll help you get on track to sustainability.

Tags: energy efficiency, restaurant trends, sustainable food, water efficiency
Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

The National Restaurant Association released its annual Kitchen Innovation awards last week, and not surprising the list is dominated with green innovations offering everything from green cleaners to energy efficiency. Not all the items are necessarily new to the market or new technology, but it appears that the commercial kitchen manufacturers have caught on that saving their customers energy and money is a good strategy.

My current favorites are the heat recovery systems on the Champion and Hobart dishwashers, and the Vegawatt system. I love the idea of capturing waste heat, which we tend to have a lot of in commercial kitchens, and making your own energy from waste products. I’m looking forward to a Mr. Fusion style system that uses not just waste oil, but all the kitchen and table scraps to power the lights.

Here is a list of the KI products that have some sort of green accolade:

Activeion Cleaning Solutions, LLC – The ionator EXP
A hand-held, on-demand power cleaner that converts tap water into ionized water — a powerful dirt-removing, bacteria-killing agent. When used as directed, the ionator EXP kills 99.999 percent of harmful bacteria without the use of toxic chemicals.

Champion Industries – E2series Flight with Quad Rinse
A unique linkage between the conveyor and the water flow control conserves water and energy use, as hot water input is reduced proportionately, when the speed of the conveyor is slowed.

Champion Industries – Heat Recovery Unit with Temp-Sure system
This innovation eliminates the need to pre-heat the final rinse water, to conserve energy, while the temp-sure system continually monitors outlet temperature and adjusts airflow to maintain the proper rinse temperature.

Henny Penny Corporation – iControl for Evolution Elite
The Gas Evolution Elite Open Fryer now offers the new iControl, which monitors all fryer activity. iControl provides the operator with data to improve oil usage, meet product quality standards, and continuously optimize frying operations.

Hobart Corporation – Ventless AM Warewasher
The Hobart AM Ventless eliminates the need for purchase and installation of a hood. It’s the first ventless door-type that recaptures water vapor, and condenses it, to heat the incoming cold water inlet for the final rinse cycle.

Middleby Corp. – Middleby Marshall Mini WOW Oven
This high speed conveyor oven with the Middleby Marshall patented energy-eye and motor sleep mode technology automatically powers down between uses and saves 30 percent in energy compared to prior models.

Vegawatt – Vegawatt Cogeneration System
Vegawatt is a fully automated and work-flow integrated energy cogeneration (CHP) system that generates on-site electricity and hot water for foodservice operations by using the waste vegetable oil from the fryers as a fuel source.

Tags: energy efficiency, green cleaners, heat recovery, water efficiency
Posted in Equipment, Green Cleaning, Reuse | 2 Comments »

In one of my last posts on water conservation I mentioned significant savings several times, but never got a chance to calculate some of those potential savings. So, here are a few of the numbers…in somewhat unscientific fashion…

First, there is not a lot of data on water use in restaurants, and the data that is available is not very detailed and varies quite a bit. What is available shows use anywhere from 900 gallons per day to well over 7000 gallons per day so its hard to say what an average would be. In addition, most of the numbers that are available tend to just give rounded numbers for an entire restaurant’s use rather than broken down to individual uses like dishwashing, hand sinks, etc. So, I’ll try to make an estimation based on general use rather than being based on total use.

Lets take the aerator idea as an example. Say a restaurant has a number of faucets all with 2.2 gallon per minute aerators installed. Over the course of the day, all the sink uses (minus the dish sink and dishwasher) add up to two hours. So every time someone washed their hands, rinsed some vegetables, filled a glass of water, or a mop bucket the total running time of the faucets added up to two hours. This is a fairly conservative estimate based on the water use data, and also assumes the restaurant did not thaw frozen product under running water, which can add over two hours of use alone.

Total water usage and cost at this establishment would then be:

120 (minutes) * 2.2 gpm = 264 gallons / 1000 = .264 kgal * $7^[1] = $1.85 per day

$1.85 * 360 days a year = $666.00 per year for faucet use.

.264 kg * 360 = 95.04 kgal per year

Now lets assume they installed 1.0 gpm aerators in all the faucets. As I mentioned in the previous post, this would reduce their water consumption by 55%. However, because a certain percentage of the water use is for drinking or recipes, or other uses where an absolute amount of water is required regardless of the aerator we cannot assume a straight 55% reduction in water consumption. Based on data from restaurant water consumption reports, lets assume 35%[2] of use is non-absolute amounts. Meaning handwashing, rinsing produce and any other water use that does not need a set amount like a glass of water would. I’ll use time as the divisible factor, and 2.2 gpm for the 57% of use that is for absolute needs rather than calculate it at 1.0 gpm, and multiply it by 2.2 to get what the actual use would be.

The water use and cost with 1.0 gpm aerators would then be:

78 (minutes) * 2.2 gpm = 171.6 gallons / 1000 = .172 kgal * $7 = $1.20 per day

42 (35% of total) * 1.0 gpm = 42 gallons / 1000 = .042 kgal * $7 = $.29 per day

(1.20 + .29) * 360 days = $536.40 / year

(.172 kgal + .042 kgal) * 360 = 77.04 kgal / year

$666.00 (cost with 2.2 gpm aerators) – $536.40 (cost with 1.0 aerators) = $129.60 savings per year

So, $130 a year may not seem like a “significant” savings, but considering the amount invested (roughly $2 per aerator) the payback is huge. That is about a one-month payback period if seven aerators were replaced with no maintenance or updating needed ever. Unlike other efficiency measures, faucet aerators are an install and forget it fix. There is no other measure that is as cost effective. Basically, regardless of how one calculates the savings, or the restaurant’s daily water use low-flow aerators are a simple, low cost solution that should be used in every establishment.

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[1] http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS163067+24-Sep-2008+MW20080924

[2] American Water Works Association Research Foundation, Commercial and Institutional End Uses of Water, DeOreo, William et. al., 2000

Tags: aerators, water efficiency
Posted in Waste Reduction, Water | 1 Comment »