A couple of facts most people know about Wisconsin: it’s got a lot of snow and a lot of cheese. So it was just a matter of time before the two things would converge. In Milwaukee, which averages about 50 in. of snow each winter, a pilot program now has workers spreading cheese brine — a superabundant byproduct of the cheese-making process — on icy roadways. The idea is to combine the salty liquid with traditional rock salt to thaw frozen roads; the brine helps rock salt stick, leading to less salt bouncing or washing off roads, and ultimately shrinking costs and reducing pollution.
MORE: Wisconsin’s other upcycling breakthrough: a hydroelectric renaissance.
Granted, it’s a mildly stinky solution, but it’s already proven successful in some of the state’s smaller localities. In Polk County, near Wisconsin’s northwest border, officials estimate that they saved almost $40,000 in rock salt costs in 2009, the year they started using cheese brine on the highways. Recycling the dairy waste also reduces the costs of hauling it and processing it at waste-treatment plants — huge expenses, considering that Wisconsin produced 2.7 billion lbs. of cheese in 2012. So far, no one’s complained about any scent of mozzarella or provolone on the ground, though it would seem a small price to pay for a state of proud cheeseheads.
Tag: Wisconsin
America’s Hydroelectric Renaissance Starts in Wisconsin
Wisconsin-based Bill Harris knows all about upcycling. His company, Renewable World Energies, is renovating aging, 100-year old hydroelectric plants and boosting their energy production by as much as 50 percent with modern turbine technology. Talk about an upgrade! Just like every other power source, hydro creates some environmental concerns, including emissions and potential damage to wildlife at dammed reservoirs. But there’s no arguing it has a clean, renewable role to play in our country’s energy future.
Source: Milwaukee-Wisconsin Journal Sentinel
These Kindergarteners Already Speak More Languages Than You
Students at one Wisconsin elementary school are learning to read, write and speak two languages…at the tender age of five! Schurz Elementary start kindergarteners in a dual language, Spanish-English program that runs all the way through elementary school. Their teacher currently teaches 80% of the day’s lessons in Spanish, and the program helps both Spanish-speaking students who are learning English as a second language and vice versa. The district is planning on adding more classes at the middle school level, to make sure that students continue to use their language skills and remain fluently bilingual.
This College Is Creating Laboratories for Sustainable Living
Colleges are a great place to try out sustainable living initiatives. They reduce operating costs, provide learning opportunities for students, and can be incorporated into a wide variety of programs. So Western Technical College in Wisconsin is making some of its facilities “living laboratories” to educate students on sustainable living. The college is adding a curriculum to teach passive house construction (building houses that use insulation and air circulation to reduce energy consumption by 80%), and will be able to construct real homes as part of the learning process. The college is also adding a program in hydro technology, in which students will learn to operate a dam that generates electricity. Western’s initiatives are a great example of sustainable living laboratories, as the programs pay for themselves and open a wide variety of educational opportunities for college students and the community.