Roles of ohmic heating to achieve sustainable development goals in the food industry: From reduced energy consumption and resource optimization to innovative production pathways with reduced carbon footprint

Abstract

Background

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by the United Nations set targets to address global social, economic, and environmental issues. The food industry is crucial to achieving SDGs due to its impact on hunger, health, economic growth, and environmental sustainability. Conventional food processing falls short of these goals, necessitating alternative technologies, such as ohmic heating, a key technology capable of driving the food industry in a sustainable direction.

Scope and approach

This review aims to explain various aspects attained from the application of ohmic heating correlated with the SDGs.

Key findings and conclusion

Literature analysis shows that ohmic heating could significantly contribute to SDGs 2 (zero hunger), 3 (good health and well-being), 6 (clean water and sanitation), 7 (affordable and clean energy), 9 (industry, innovation, and infrastructure), 12 (responsible consumption and production), 13 (climate action), among other goals. These could be achieved because of the ohmic process's capability to increase the production yield (e.g., pectin by 8.9%; essential oil by 51.2%) and shelf-life (e.g., pasteurized milk by 1.7 times), produce healthier and more nutritious products (e.g., dried quince with 2 times phenolics), reduce food waste through valorization (e.g., transforming lemon peel to pectin and essential oil), enhance production infrastructure due to improved energy efficiency (e.g., 72.8% in evaporation process). Unique insights into ohmic heating's mechanistic principles, scalability challenges, and integration with other approaches (e.g., renewable energy systems and artificial intelligence) are presented. The review identifies critical research gaps and proposes a future research roadmap to improve its industrial applicability and expand its practical role in achieving SDGs.