How To Make Your Car Smell Like French Fries

An article in today's Pittsburgh Post Gazette details a partnership that GTECH Strategies (Growth Through Energy and Community Health), a CMU-Heinz College social innovation spinoff and Echoing Green Fellowship winner, has with Pittsburgh-based  Optimus Technologies / Fossil Free Fuels to collect used cooking oil from local restaurants and other institutions for use in vehicles with converted diesel engines.  By their estimates, Pittsburgh generates an estimated 500,000 gallons of cooking oil annually, much of which is dumped in landfills or literally down the drain, causing not only environmental issues but an economic liability for companies.

GTECH has been filling brownfields with sunflowers for the past three years with the dual purposes of environmental remediation and economic development, and their efforts have expanded to areas including post-Katrina New Orleans.  The partners have already secured $650,000 in grants this year to collect and convert vegetable oil, to convert engines and to build two alternative fueling stations.  

As Andrew Butcher, CEO of GTECH and a Heinz College alum put it:

"This is a sweet spot for GTECH -- the economic potential in eliminating an environmental liability."

They are also working on a $1.6 million expansion plan that would generate 2.5 million gallons of renewable fuels per year and includes converting a block of abandoned buildings in Braddock (an economically distressed area of the city) for a vehicle conversion garage, fueling station, processing and distribution facility, and research lab for cooking and seed oil fuels.

I think this effort highlights some of the characteristics of next generation social innovation ventures--multidisciplinary, multipurpose, scalable, leveraged by strategic partnerships, and, perhaps most importantly, with a business plan that recognizes financial sustainability as a critical success factor.

What do you think?  

Innovating an Ancient Food

Innovations often happen by thinking about old things in new ways.  A recent article in the Washington Post explains how China's expanding population and water shortages, in part caused by growing crops like rice and wheat, are driving new innovations in potatoes.


Yes, the simple spud is getting new attention as a way to stave off poverty and famine, maintain economic growth, and ensure social harmony.  It simply takes less water to grow potatoes and their yield far more calories per acre (a great metric) than traditional alternatives.


The numbers describing the magnitude of the problem don't lie: China as to feed 1/5 of the world's population on 1/10 of the planet's arable land, and the nation's expanding cities are consuming farmland at breakneck speed.

China estimates that by 2030, when its population is expected to level off at roughly 1.5 billion, it will need to produce an additional 100 million tons of food each year.

New, exotic potato varieties are being developed, a major potato research center is being launched in Beijing with the International Potato Center, and entrepreneurs are creating new potato-based foods in traditional forms (buns, noodles, cakes) to accelerate acceptance.  In addition, the government has announced subsidies for farmers who grow high yield seed potatoes and expanded farmer training programs focused on innovative ways to raise crops (and rural incomes).  And it's a good time to be in the Chinese potato business.  Wholesale prices increased 85 percent from November to April, thanks in part to a severe drought that has limited supply.


Think these developments don't affect you?  According to the article:

China has a long-standing policy of food self-sufficiency, growing 95 percent of the grain required to feed its people. The country's sheer size means that a major crop failure or other food emergency here could have international ramifications, overwhelming world food markets with sudden demand.

Just goes to show that sometimes the catalysts for innovation are right in front of us.  We just need to see the world in a new way.