Sustainability
PurposeEnergy Opens $40M Food Waste and Wastewater Pre-Treatment Facility
PurposeEnergy, which designs, builds, owns and operates industrial anaerobic digestion infrastructure, has commissioned its industrial food waste and wastewater pre-treatment facility in Minster, Ohio.
This facility converts wastewater and high-strength organic food waste residuals piped directly from Danone USA's largest U.S. yogurt manufacturing facility, and from other regional food and beverage producers, into renewable biogas, water treated to municipal discharge standards and nutrient-rich soil amendments.
PurposeEnergy’s Minster facility represents an investment of more than $40 million and is the company's first project with Danone. Designed to process up to 250,000 gallons per day, the project is expected at full operation to produce about 50,000 MMBtu of renewable biogas per year. That biogas is piped to a dedicated boiler at Danone's Minster plant, where it displaces conventional natural gas. Using standard EPA/EIA combustion emission factors, this is equivalent to displacing approximately 3,200 U.S. tons of CO2e per year.
"This project is an excellent example of PurposeEnergy's role in creating circularity benefits for food and beverage manufacturing," says Eric Fitch, founder and CEO of PurposeEnergy. "Food manufacturers shouldn't have to choose between growing production and meeting their environmental commitments. With this facility anchored near Danone's Minster plant, we can give our partner a solution that supports both their goals."
For the Village of Minster, the project reduces strain on municipal infrastructure. Water leaving the PurposeEnergy facility is treated well above the village's discharge standards, with surplus nutrients and dissolved solids removed before it reaches the municipal wastewater treatment works.
PurposeEnergy estimates piping residuals directly from Danone's Minster plant to the facility avoids about 720 U.S. tons of CO2e each year versus the previous off-site handling route.
"The PurposeEnergy facility is an example of our Danone Impact Journey in action and part of our wider Re-Fuel energy excellence program, helping turn organic material from our Minster plant into renewable biogas that can be piped back to the plant and used through a new biogas boiler,” says Danone Americas COO Heiko Gerling. “What makes this project especially meaningful is how it brings together industry, local infrastructure and community stakeholders around a shared goal. It is a powerful example of how operational growth and environmental stewardship can go hand in hand.”
PurposeEnergy’s Minster facility is operational and ramping, with a grand opening celebration planned for spring of 2027.
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