While Tuesday was officially Earth Day, at the Divert, Inc. facility in west Turlock, working to make the planet a better place to live is a year-round endeavor. California State Treasurer Fiona Ma got an up-close look at how Divert is tackling the wasted food crisis during a tour of the facility on Earth Day.
“I was last here about two and half years ago for the groundbreaking and today, we’re going to be doing a tour to see all of the amazing processes that they are doing to divert 100,000 tons of unsold food every year, offsetting 97,000 metric tons of carbon. And this is not just data, this is climate action,” said Ma.
“We are all stewards and responsible for caring for the earth…so diverting precious resources out of our landfills to change it and convert it into reusable, sustainable biogas is what this plant is all about.”
The state-of-the-art renewable energy plant from Massachusetts-based technology company Divert Inc. began operations in the W. Main Street facility in November 2024. It was the 11th plant built in the United States by Divert, which was founded in 2007 by CEO Ryan Begin and COO Nick Whitman. They have a goal of opening 30 plants by 2031. Divert’s business model entails retailers paying the facility to take in and process food waste. From there, the process of sorting food and turning waste into renewable energy begins.
After trucks drop off unsold food, employees at the Turlock facility separate the waste from its packaging, before sending it to be liquefied, purified and processed into a slurry. Ammonia sulfate removed from liquefaction and purification processes can be sold as a fertilizer ingredient. As for the slurry, it’s then pumped directly into an on-site, anaerobic, 3.5 million-gallon digester, where it is turned into biogas — a mixture of gases, primarily consisting of methane, carbon dioxide and hydrogen sulfide. The equipment then removes impurities from the biogas and upgrades it into pipeline quality Renewable Natural Gas (RNG) to meet utility company standards. Divert has partnered with PG&E, and there is an on-site transmission line.
Divert is helping to meet the mandates of SB 1383, signed into law in 2016 by then-governor Jerry Brown, to establish a statewide effort to reduce emissions of short-lived climate pollutants in various sectors of California's economy, including the food and retail industry. Beginning in 2022, the law required every jurisdiction to provide organic waste collection services to all residents and businesses. Additionally, businesses had to begin collecting, sorting and transferring organic waste to a specified composting facility, community composting program or other collection activity or program.
“When you throw your food waste into a landfill, it emits methane. Methane is 88 times more potent of a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, and it also breaks down over only 12 years. So, if we get food waste out of the landfill, we can reduce the amount of methane that’s going into the atmosphere and really cut the curve on the emissions in a very quick timeline,” said Holly Yanai, the senior manager of public affairs for Divert, Inc.
