Identifying Cool Food Meals

This technical note describes the methodology used by the World Resources Institute (WRI) to identify 'Cool Food Meals' on food provider menus, focusing on greenhouse gas emission thresholds and nutritional quality safeguards.

• The World Resources Institute (WRI) identifies Cool Food Meals by requiring that dishes fall below a maximum threshold of per-meal greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, determined using recipe data submitted to WRI and calculation methods from the Cool Food Pledge.
• To be classified as Cool Food Meals, dishes must also pass a nutrition safeguard to verify they meet a minimum threshold of nutritional quality.
• The Cool Food global initiative intends to assist food providers in selling dishes with smaller climate footprints to accelerate the transition to a sustainable food future by steering consumers toward low-emitting options.

APA

World Resources Institute (n.d.). Identifying Cool Food Meals. https://www.wri.org/research/identifying-cool-food-meals

Chicago

World Resources Institute. Identifying Cool Food Meals. n.d. https://www.wri.org/research/identifying-cool-food-meals.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=World Resources Institute |title=Identifying Cool Food Meals |url=https://www.wri.org/research/identifying-cool-food-meals |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{worldresourcesinstitutendidentifying, author = {{World Resources Institute}}, title = {{Identifying Cool Food Meals}}, institution = {World Resources Institute}, url = {https://www.wri.org/research/identifying-cool-food-meals}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }