2:10pm Friday 16th October 2009
Food waste at Waitrose in Balham is being recycled into renewable energy.
The store uses anaerobic digestion techniques to recycle raw meat and liquids, and packaged and out-of-date stock.
Waitrose Recycling and Waste Manager, Arthur Sayer, said: “Anaerobic digestion (AD) is a sustainable way for us to eliminate the need to send food waste to landfill, helping us to reduce our impact on the environment and we’re delighted to have recently extended its use across a quarter of our shops.
"This system will play a vital role in achieving our objective of recycling 95 per cent of all our waste by 2013.”
A Waitrose spokesman said the food waste, including animal by-products, is mixed with pig manure to form a substrate which is pasteurised and passed into a fermenter for anaerobic digestion (AD).
Bacteria break the food waste down and the methane gas produced is converted into electricity for the National Grid.
The remaining by-product, a liquid digestate, is an excellent organic fertilizer which is used on the land, completing the natural life cycle.
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