waste

Tesco Uses Meat Power to Divert Waste From Landfills

Ariel Schwartz — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 15:31:01 -0400

British grocery chain Tesco has some good news: it has managed to divert 100% of its waste from landfills. But there's a catch: the chain is using expired meat to do it.

A Cheap Solution to Portland Airport's Liquid Waste Problem

Ariel Schwartz — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 10:11:06 -0400

Ever wince at the amount of waste left over from tossed toiletries and bottled drinks at airport security lines. So do airports--and not just because of the environmental costs. Hauling away these heavy containers costs big money for cities--up to $75,000 a year in some cases.

How To Make Electricity From Waste Onion Juice

Ariel Schwartz — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 14:05:45 -0400

Onion juice can do more than just make us sob; it can also be used for electricity. Gills Onions, a California wholesale producer of sliced, diced, slivered and puréed onions, introduced a system today to turn its 300,000 pounds of daily agricultural waste into valuable energy.

Is MillerCoors the Most Environmentally Responsible Brewing Company?

Ariel Schwartz — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 14:37:35 -0400

This past May, we took a look at five of the most environmentally responsible beers--Cascade Green, Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, Grassroots Ale, Fat Tire, and Brooklyn Sustainable Porter. But as it turns out, a nice watered-down can of Miller High Life might be more sustainable than all of them.

MIT Develops Electronic Tags to Track Waste

Ariel Schwartz — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 14:08:11 -0400

A New Kind of Carpet Burn: Shaw Industries to Power Facility With Carpets

Ariel Schwartz — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 13:29:03 -0400

We've seen factories powered by food waste, landfill trash, and brewery waste. Now Georgia carpet manufacturer Shaw Industries is building a carpet-to-energy facility fueled by carpet materials from manufacturing operations and post-consumer collections.

Dell Now Gets Over a Quarter of Its Electricity From Renewable Sources

Ariel Schwartz — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 14:22:25 -0400

The IT industry is known for its electricity-sucking tendencies and carbon emissions, which is why Dell's announcement that it now sources 26% of its electricity from renewable sources--up from 20% in 2008--is so admirable. The company now powers nine facilities in the U.S.

Machine Turns Boring Office Memos Into What They Should Be: Toilet Paper

Ariel Schwartz — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 15:32:32 -0400

Tokyo-based manufacturer Nakabayashi has come up with a unique solution to the problem of excess used printer paper: an in-house machine that turns used A4-sized copier paper into toilet rolls. Nakabayashi's massive 600 kg machine can create two rolls each hour from used paper.

Waste Expo

Fast Company Calendar — Wed, 20 May 2009 17:29:19 -0400

A hot topic at this meet-up of solid-waste execs will be the booming business of trash to cash. Some 55% of American waste still ends up in landfills, and operators in this $52 billion industry have long been required to collect and dispose of the by-product, methane gas. Well, waste not, want not: In 2003, some began turning it into energy. There are now 469 landfill-to-gas projects in the U.S., delivering 310 million cubic meters of gas daily -- enough to power 1.6 million homes. How wonderfully trashy. --Kate Rockwood

Green Seal Sets Standard for Eco-Savvy Restaurants

Ariel Schwartz — Fri, 15 May 2009 16:48:54 -0400

Restaurants taking the time to become more energy-efficient and less wasteful can now officially prove their mettle with Green Seal's ecolabeling standard for restaurants. The GS-46 seal's gold, silver, and bronze levels are awarded based on responsible food purchasing practices and overall waste reduction of restaurants and catering services.

Enerkem Plant to Turn Landfill Trash into Ethanol

Ariel Schwartz — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 14:44:36 -0400

The movie Idiocracy paints a bleak (yet hilarious) picture of a future overtaken by thousand-foot-high landfills that topple over into the streets. Fortunately, a Montreal-based biofuel and green chemical company called Enerkem has taken the first step to preventing such a future with its Mississippi trash-to-ethanol plant.

Is "Green IT" A Sham?

Ariel Schwartz — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 15:47:45 -0500

Green IT is all the rage these days, with companies like Apple, Dell, Oracle, and Microsoft touting the energy efficiency and low carbon footprints of their data centers. But is IT ever really environmentally friendly?

Why The Reign of Conventional Batteries Is Nearly Over

Kit Eaton — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 07:28:06 -0500

As usual this holiday season millions of kids will be opening gifts that a caring parent must crack open immediately to jam in batteries before the playing can begin. Since its invention in 1800 as the "Voltaic pile" by Alessandro Volta and subsequent dubbing as "the battery" via Ben Franklin, trillions of the tiny chemical powerhouses have been used similarly. And then discarded, to spill their spent chemical loads into the ground. But the reign of the conventional battery is nearly over.

Half Price Food Before Close: Chasing the Charitable Choux

Lynette Chiang — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 17:11:50 -0500

GOODONYA!

That's Aussie for "good for you" to Joe and Chris Miller of Platteville, CO, for letting people help themselves to the leftovers on their harvested field.

In a 'bring your doggy bag' of epic proportions, the invitation attracted over 40,000 scavengers to the Miller's farmlands, literally scraping their land back to the earth's mantle.

Waste is...well, Just A Waste!

Terry Tamminen — Fri, 30 May 2008 17:25:13 -0400

In a recent blog, I told you
about a trip to Walmart and how they have slashed waste in all of their stores,
saving money and the environment at the same time. The more I talk about this,
the more I realize how many companies are starting to look for “gold” and
“green” in the dumpster.

Back in the 1990s, California passed a law to divert half its waste from landfills