In Missouri, Grind2Energy, the food waste recycling system from Emerson, created an industrial food grinder that helps address the costs and environmental impacts of food waste disposal from grocery stores, restaurants and stadiums. The equipment turns food waste from commercial kitchens into a nutrient-rich slurry that anaerobic digesters can turn into biogas and fertilizer.
The first models of the food waste recycling system used a manual process to handle maintenance and the hauling of the slurry to the anaerobic digester, but the Grind2Energy team turned to AT&T to integrate Internet of Things (IoT) connectivity and robust reporting into the food waste recycling system, helping to increase scalability and increase the market competitiveness of the system.
If just 10% of the over 38,000 grocery stores in the U.S. used Grind2Energy’s sensor-driven industrial food waste systems to manage their food waste, GHG emissions could be reduced by up to 320,000 metric tons a year.