To combat the issue of food waste, U of I Housing collaborated with F&S Utilities & Energy Services, Operations, Maintenance & Alterations, and environmental compliance. The committee researched various food waste options, including composting, pulpers, and grinder systems used for anaerobic digestion -- including Grind2Energy systems.
Attached are the meeting minutes and chat from the Zero Waste SWATeam meeting on 10/16.
Discussed were the following topics:
Reducing Food Waste
Vending Machine Alternatives to Single-use plastics
Plastic Recovery
Single Use Plastics
Illini Union Shadowbox attachment
Food Literacy Project
In 2018, all 6 Enviropures were decommissioned. At the beginning of the 2019-2020 school year, Dining began the installation of the first Grind2Energy system. See the Grind2Energy project page for more details.
Good afternoon,
Yesterday afternoon, the question of how much carbon dioxide does an Enviropure unit produce was asked. I’ve copied the information below from their website:
“According to the EPA and USCC, carbon dioxide emissions generated from the aerobic decomposition of food waste by systems such as the EnviroPure systems are considered to be “biogenic”. This means that our EnviroPure Systems and the carbon it returns to the environment are part of the natural carbon cycle and so it does not contribute to greenhouse gases and global warming.”
