Diageo plc (Diageo), a UK based company engaged in the drinks business with a collection of international brands, has announced that its Plainfield, Illinois facility is introducing a new byproduct reuse program that will send berries and seeds from gin production to local composting site of Waste Management, Inc. Additionally, the company is expanding its paper-recycling program in Plainfield.
The company is beginning a new initiative that changes municipal solid waste into power and steam instead of sending it to a landfill at its Amherstberg, Ontario facility.
Both these initiatives will deliver considerable energy savings and keep more than 400 tons of waste out of landfills each year.
“One of the most significant ways we can reduce our carbon footprint is by limiting the amount of waste we send to landfills,’ said Dave Wengerhoff, senior vice president of Diageo’s brand technical center. ‘By expanding our paper recycling program, finding innovative ways to reuse byproduct, and converting solid waste into power and steam, we are making positive strides towards establishing zero waste to landfill – a central goal in Diageo’s commitment to sustainability.”
At the Plainfield facility, the paper-recycling program in the technical center was expanded to include cardboard, packing materials such as plastic wrap and bottles, and Styrofoam. It is anticipated that this expansion will result in annual savings of around 928 trees, 3,276,000 gallons of water, and an energy savings of 12,285 kilowatt hours. The expanded recycling program and new byproduct reuse initiative will help the Plainfield facility keep nearly 200 tons per year out of the landfill, which is equivalent to 126,048 gallon milk bottles.
The byproduct reuse program, meanwhile, is already under way as the facility is storing the seeds and berries on site in extra containers until the compost site opens in April. The program is anticipated to keep nearly 66 tons of waste out of the landfill each year.
At the Amherstberg plant, all of the site’s municipal solid waste, previously destined for landfills, is now being sent to a refuse-derived fuel waste-to-energy plant. The solid waste is utilized to power a steam plant that produces up to 68 megawatts of electricity, which is sold to the Detroit Edison Corporation. By using this process, around 245 tons of waste will be kept out of the landfill each year and, in total, 100% of the site’s waste to landfill is now being diverted to help create energy.