Ideas for recommendation related to post-consumer waste reduction, recommendations to continue in Spring semester

Matt Turino at the Sustainable Student Farm provided this overview of the food waste handling / transportation related to the Vermicompost project.

"So we only collected Pre-consumer waste from Busey-Evans so only the things that were cut off the usuable parts of vegetables and fruits.  We had special  30 gallon trash cans that only existed in the kitchen of the Busey-Evans so there was almost never other kinds of trash.  If we saw some while handling we would remove it but we did not need to sort it.

We had no packaging or animal products in the compost.

We used a pick up truck to transport the containers and we did not have a good way to load these.  We often had to lift 50-90 lb trash containers up into the truck bed, and us not having the correct equipment contributed to it not being a sustainable program for us.  The waste was extremely wet and so something that made it tricky to handle and and to transport.  We were using leaves from U of I landscaping for the Brown material.

I did not track the cost of our transportation because we would often drop our produce off and pick up the waste on the same trip.  We were driving a pickup truck about 3 miles per trip 2-3 times a week.  We were picking up between 60-100 gallons of food waste per week during the semester. 

Also we were using a vermi-compost unit which was not the most effective system for this, if you wanted to do a composting set up I would recommend a larger windrow set up."

Ximing Cai and Morgan White met with students Sohinee Oswal and Devaki Belwalkar about their food waste reduction app "Dibbs."  We discussed the possibility of connecting their efforts with iCAP objectives.  They are focused primarily on grocery stores, so the best option for working together is for Dibbs to connect with Dining Services and their convenience stores (Chomps, 57 North, and Penn Station).

The greenhouse is built, the bin is constructed, bedding logistics are in place, and food waste collection should begin the week after spring break. Ramp up to about 150-200 lbs of food waste processing per week should be complete in about 4-5 months. For this bin and the way it fits into the SSF management plan, we’d never process more than 250-300# of actual food waste a week. This would make for a max range of 7,000-14,000 lbs of food waste processed per year (47 weeks, we wouldn’t collect waste during Christmas and Spring Break). 

If there is any confusion about this PILOT vermicomposting project I’d like to clarify it here, because I have gotten a few requests from outside sources about taking in outside food waste (word spreads quickly). This particular unit is only meant as a pilot demonstration to prove this can be done on a larger (potential campus wide) scale. This 5x16 unit we have is an example of one part of what could be a much larger facility. However, if this is successful I would like to see that facility be something that the SSF does not manage, and ideally in another specifically built piece of infrastructure to house a larger scale process. The greenhouse also serves as our transplant production house. Between the existing unit and managing the transplant production system, the SSF has more than it can already incorporate into its existing management.

That being said, once the system is up and running, we’d love to showcase this to any number of relevant parties and incorporate the data into any Zero Waste policy the campus has. As well as any other sustainability metrics the campus tracks.

From: Kevin Wolz [mailto:wolz1@illinois.edu]
Sent: Sunday, May 26, 2013 10:48 AM
To: Johnston, Morgan B
Cc: Litchfield, J Bruce; Werpetinski, Valeri A; Beverage, McKenzie; Andrew Gazdziak; Wolz, Kevin James; Branham, Bruce E
Subject: Fwd: SOLAR QUOTE

Hi Morgan,

I've attached the latest and best solar quote we have received for the solar array to be placed on the roof of the fruit farm building (funded by the SSC via the LINC EV SSF class). I am still waiting for (1) the system specs and schematics from this company which I will forward as soon as I get them and (2) a few more conversations with Crop Sci and ACES people once I get back in the country in June 1. However, I wanted to send this to you so you could advise on what else I need to provide and get from F&S to make this a go. 

Thanks so much! 

Kevin