By Holly Van Woerkom
Taleah Howard always wondered about the purpose of the pulper.
One day while working at the Cannon Center last year, Howard, now a sophomore, was assigned to work on food prep, and spent her shift cutting melons and pineapples. She was told to put only certain parts of the fruit into the pulper.
'It was all really specific,' she said. Then, laughing, she admitted, 'I was afraid I was going to accidentally put the one thing in the pulper that wasn't supposed to go in, and I would break the whole thing.'
As a result of the pulper system, the university saves $30,000 to $50,000 annually in landfill charges and directly reduces its environmental impact. Because BYU is the collegiate leader in this technology, many schools visit the campus annually to learn from it, says Dean Wright, director of Dining Services.
Food waste such as the shreds of lettuce, half-eaten enchiladas and strings of spaghetti that come through the Cannon Center tray line have a much more fulfilling life than one might expect.
Since 1990, BYU has used what is called a pulper system in all its major kitchens on campus, including the Cannon Center, the Wilkinson Student Center and the MTC cafeteria. The system allows BYU Dining Services to capture its food waste for BYU Grounds to use as compost, instead of disposing it through a garbage disposal down the drain and sending it to a landfill. According to the Dining Services Web site, less waste goes to landfill from BYU Dining Services than any other school with a dining program of the same size.
So what exactly happens to the food waste that goes through a BYU pulper system?
Picture a giant blender. In goes the food waste, which comes from food preparation areas and pre-dishwasher leftovers from the tray lines - like, say, your untouched vegetable medley from dinnertime.
The food waste is then blended with recycled water and pumped into what is called a screw press. The moisture is extracted from the food waste, and eventually, out comes a very dense pulp, which is then taken to a compost area, where wood chips are used as a bulking agent. The compost is then ready for the grounds crew to enrich campus landscaping.
During the wintertime, compost is stockpiled and kept at the Material Handling Area, which is located north of Wyview. Last year, the total amount of finished compost was 1,867 cubic yards - that's enough to fill more than 622 grounds crew gardening trucks. This large amount of compost is especially useful when the grounds crew prepares campus landscaping for springtime and the graduation events.
'People really don't know how much mulch it takes for large properties like this,' said Will Terris, gardening maintenance supervisor for BYU Grounds.
Grounds Maintenance Director Roy Peterman said one of the main benefits of using compost in campus landscaping is the water savings. 'We achieve about 33 percent water savings,' he said. 'By mixing compost in soils, another 33 percent is saved, which produces an optimum growing medium. ... It's the right thing to do. We're interested in protecting our environment. This putrifiable waste is what causes methane gases in the landfills, and it contaminates the water and the air.'
Howard said she was astonished at the amount of food she saw left on the trays in the Cannon Center alone. 'We just waste so much food,' she said, 'but when you know that at least the food is being put to good use, it makes you feel better. At least we're doing something good with our trash.'