At the conclusion of the Clean50 awards on September 28th, Enviro-Stewards Food Loss and Waste Prevention project at Campbell Soup was selected as the top Sustainability Project in Canada for 2018. Campbells was already diverting 99% of its’ food waste to a biogas facility.
Even so, Enviro-Stewards Food Loss + Waste Reduction demonstration project through Provision Coalition identified practical opportunities to avoid creating almost 1,000 tonnes/year of food waste in the first place. These opportunities will save Campbells $706,000 per year with a 6 month payback and avoid 4,000 tonnes/yr of (embedded) Greenhouse gas emissions compared to the already relatively responsible practice of diversion of food waste to make biogas.
Also at the Clean50 awards, Enviro-Stewards project for Southbrook Winery project received a national sustainability award and Enviro-Stewards’ founder, Bruce Taylor, was selected as the top sustainability consultant. Southbrook had recently completed an energy conservation assessment that found their LEED gold certified organic & biodynamic winery could save an additional 5% of their energy with a 20-year payback. Enviro-Stewards’ subsequent energy conservation assessment found that the facility could actually save 40% of their energy with a 4-month payback. This resulted in Southbrook installing 1/3 less solar panels and hence conserving ½ acre of vineyard that would otherwise have been covered with solar panels (saving 50 cases per year of wine!).
Also on September 28th, Global Compact Canada selected Enviro-Stewards was awarded a Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Award 2017 by the Global Compact Network Canada (the Canadian network of the UN Global Compact). In 2004, Enviro-Stewards founded the safe water project. This project trains and equips community groups in South Sudan and Kenya to sustainably provide safe water. Enviro-Stewards collaborates with CAWST to provide train the trainer biosand filter implementer training. They then provide the groups with social venture business training and sales training that helps residents understand how purchasing their own locally made biofilter is typically about 10 times less expensive than their family’s present expenditures on water related illnesses. Although the primary focus is on safe water, the method that the projects are delivered also help the most of the other development goals.
Many of the South Sudanese project managers have lost everything and are currently refugees in Northern Uganda (in and around Bidi Bidi, which has grown to be the largest refugee camp in the world). Even though the managers have lost all of their possessions, they have retained their capacity and are restarting safe water projects in Northern Uganda. The teams have already provided more than 3,000 people in their host communities with safe water since February 2017.