By: Er Mohammad Ashraf Fazili (Former Chief Engineer, Kashmir)
It is said that North America and the world are working up to a very large and very real problem that needs to be addressed sooner rather than later, managing food waste. A recent report from Value Chain Management International found that “more than $31 billion worth of food is wasted every year in Canada and when energy, water and other resource costs are factored in the true cost could be up to three times that much.”
Where does all this food waste go? Into our local landfills, where organic food waste produces methane, a potent greenhouse gas with 21 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide. Even worse, landfills are a major source of human -related methane in the United States, accounting for more than 20 per cent of all methane emissions.
We have a living example of this at Achan Saidpora Eidgah Srinagar dumping site where hundreds of kanals of wetland has become victim of the city’s solid waste dumping causing obnoxious stench that reaches in all directions even to the nearby Sheri Kashmir Medical Institute Soura.
“It was unsustainable waste management practices and staggering numbers like these that made us wonder how we could divert this regular flow of food waste at the source. allowing organizations to reduce their environmental impact while making their daily operations more sustainable. It was from these notions that the “Organic Refuse Conservation Alternative” came to be. Or, as we like to call it: the ORCA. The ORCA is a machine that “digests” up to 2400 pounds (over 1 ton) of food waste per day. Within 24 hours, this technology turns food waste into environmentally safe water that flows straight into the municipal sewage system.
The sustainable technology is housed in a stainless-steel container with a door on the top which employees open to throw food waste inside. Within the container, the ORCA proprietary, natural Microorganism solution works with water and recycled plastic Bio chips to quickly break down the waste. Through a process called “aerobic digestion” the ORCA technology constantly churns all this material, adding oxygen that accelerates the time it takes to transform the food waste disposal into earth friendly water.
Designed to eliminate organic food waste at its source by turning it into earth-friendly water, the ORCA is the perfect solution to our current food waste problem. When you turn your food waste into water with ORCA, you help to reduce the number of Co2 producing garbage trucks on the road, reducing the amount of organic food waste being brought to landfills, which in turn helps to curb the amount of potential methane-producing waste in our landfills. Simply put, the ORCA can help your organization become an environmentally conscious corporate citizen. The Municipal Corporation can be relieved of a great stress of collection, and disposal of garbage besides saving the wetlands from further encroachment and a relief from the obnoxious smell spreading around the city. The expenditure involved in the process can be utilized by providing the ORCA to the households at subsidized cost.
I have seen the ORCA at Abu Dhabi Exhibition a few years back.
To learn how the ORCA can help your organization achieve its current and future sustainability goals, you can contact at (contact email) or 1.855.355.ORCA (6722)
The ORCA comes in four sizes:
Type Size Wt. can process can divert from landfill
OG15 810x580x1080mm- 160kg- 7kgs/hour- 61 tons/year
OG25 1270x889x1244mm-263kg-15kg/hour 95 tons/hour
OG50 1740x889x1244.6mm -544kg-25kg/hour 189 tons/year
OG100 2921x889x1244.6mm-680kg-50kg/hour- 378 tons/year
Which model is right for you?
With four different model sizes, ORCA can accommodate any kitchen’s food waste volumes and space limitations.
All ORCA models are equipped with onboard scales that will track the weight of every piece of food waste you put into it. The scales connect to our proprietary ORCA Portal, a personalized dashboard that will allow you to analyze real-time data, create customized reports, and look at the amount of food waste diverted over time.
