Press
Waste Management invests in organics recycling
January, 2010
by Ford Gunter (Houston Business Journal)
Waste Management Inc. has agreed to invest in a Massachusetts company, Harvest Power, to expand next generation organics recycling facilities in the U.S. and Canada and tap into the 180 million-plus tons of annual organic waste produced in North America.
The announcement brings the Houston-based company into the fold with existing investors Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers of Silicon Valley and Germany’s Munich Venture Partners, both of which increased their initial stake.
Among other things, Harvest owns and operates the largest food and yard waste composting facility in North America, located in Richmond, British Columbia. Harvest is also in on the technology development game, working toward composting technologies that accelerate decomposition of organic materials through a process that creates biogas to convert into electricity, liquefied natural gas or compressed natural gas.
Waste Management (NYSE: WM) is touting the deal as a major step toward meeting three sustainability goals: doubling renewable energy production, tripling the amount of recyclables processed by 2020, and investing in emerging waste management technologies.
“We want to extract more value from the materials we manage than anyone else in our industry through new and emerging processing and conversion technologies,” said Tim Cesarek, managing director of Organic Growth at Waste Management.
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