EMISSIONS OF VOLATILE ORGANIC-COMPOUNDS (VOCS) FROM THE FOOD AND DRINK INDUSTRIES OF THE EUROPEAN-COMMUNITY

Estimates were made of the amounts of volatile organic compounds (VOCs ) released into the atmosphere as a result of the industrial manufactu re and processing of food and drink in the European Community. The est imates were based on a review of literature sources, industrial and go vernment contacts and recent measurements. Data were found on seven fo od manufacturing sectors (baking, vegetable oil extraction, solid fat processing, animal rendering, fish meal processing, coffee production and sugar beet processing) and three drink manufacturing sectors (brew ing, spirit production and wine making). The principle of a data quali ty label is advocated to illustrate the authors' confidence in the dat a, and to highlight areas for further research. Emissions of ethanol f rom bread baking and spirit maturation were found to be the principle sources. However, significant losses of hexane and large quantities of an ill-defined mixture of partially oxidized hydrocarbons were noted principally from seed oil extraction and the drying of plant material, respectively. This latter mixture included low molecular weight aldeh ydes, carboxylic acids, ketones, amines and esters. However, the preci se composition of many emissions were found to be poorly understood. T he total emission from the food and drink industry in the EC was calcu lated as 260 kt yr(-1). However, many processes within the target indu stry were found to be completely uncharacterized and therefore not inc luded in the overall estimate (e.g. soft drink manufacture, production of animal food, flavourings, vinegar, tea, crisps and other fried sna cks). Moreover, the use of data quality labels illustrated the fact th at many of our estimates were based on limited data. Hence, further em issions monitoring is recommended from identified sources (e.g. proces sing of sugar beet, solid fat and fish meal) and from uncharacterized sources.