SP0009: Food Waste Processor for In-Vessel Composting

Status: COMPLETED Summer 2010

The mission is to offer McGill Food and Dining Services an enjoyable and memorable dining at the McGill community through food destinations distinctly that reflect the culinary creativity and the essence of Montreal.

The group is committed to providing the highest quality of customer service; promote health and nutrition education, ensuring social responsibility, the implementation of effective policies and delivery of our food passion for, people and excellence.

A macerator has many uses: First, it greatly increases the surface in food waste, allowing the biological processes inside our composter tank to start working much faster. Second, it helps to maintain constant moisture content organic matter entering the compost tank. Keeping the moisture content to more than 65% can promote optimal conditions for biological activity conducted by microscopic organisms. Third, it reduces the overall volume of waste because all the air spaces have been lost through the process of maceration. This will allow the compost to deal more effectively with large amounts of food waste, increasing efficiency (from 60 tons to 100 tons per year). Finally, it creates a dry matter which is more lightweight and less messy during transport and loading in the composter.

To measure the success of this project, the weight and volume data for food waste will be collected before and after treatment.

For further information conerning this project, or to get in touch with its members, please contact the krista.houser [at] mcgill.ca (SPF Administration Team).

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