Conversion from office space to apartments is getting harder. Let’s discuss why, and also what the effort is really all about.

Only 3,575 apartment units were converted from office space last year. The already fraught process now faces even more challenges.

The Wall Street Journal explains why in its report Turning Empty Offices Into Apartments Is Getting Even Harder

Cities hoping to convert emptying office buildings into apartments are running into financing issues, stagnating rental markets and other challenges that are bottling up their efforts.

Developers last year created just 3,575 apartment units in the U.S. through office conversions, according to an analysis by rental listing site RentCafe. That amounts to less than 1% of all apartments built that year through new construction. 

Federal and local governments are also trying to give conversions a boost. The White House said last month that it was updating guidance for existing grants and spending programs to make billions in federal dollars available for these projects. It also said it would seek the conversion of more government-owned properties into housing.

Some cities, such as Washington, D.C., New York and San Francisco, are also taking steps to encourage more conversions. Tax incentives and faster approvals are “rocket fuel” for these projects, said Sheila Botting, a principal at commercial property brokerage Avison Young.

Even so, the process has always been fraught with difficulty and few office buildings are natural candidates. Conversions are easiest in older, lower-quality and mostly empty buildings with small floors. But less than 1% of office space in the biggest U.S. cities ticks those boxes, according to Avison Young.

In significant ways, the conversion process is getting even harder now. Slowing rent growth might make apartment conversions less attractive to investors, if the trend persists into next year. Asking rents for apartments have fallen 1.2% nationally over the past 12 months, according to rentals website Apartment List.

Projects Not Economical

Without massive subsidies these projects are not economically feasible. Many aren’t even with massive subsidies.

In downtown Dallas, developer Wolfe Investments seeks to convert an 18-story, 1950s office tower into residential apartments, but has recently been fighting off foreclosure from its lender, Thistle Creek Partners, court records show. 

Developers of One Camelback, a 200,000-square-foot office building in central Phoenix, are trying to convert it into what would be one of the city’s most expensive rental-apartment properties. A website advertises $8,000-a-month apartments, with floor-to-ceiling windows and crystal-clear views of nearby mountains.

But the developers, Sagamore Capital and partners defaulted on a loan of about $70 million. The project’s lender, Delphi Financial Group, has moved to foreclose. An auction of One Camelback is set for later this month, according to documents filed in Maricopa County, Ariz.

Biden Throws $45 Billion in Federal Funds to Convert Offices into Homes

On October 29, I commented Biden Throws $45 Billion in Federal Funds to Convert Offices into Homes

Questions abound. Assume you can convert offices into homes, who wants to live in them? Is a tear down cheaper?

The government has 1,500 office buildings nationally and leases on almost 200 million square feet of additional space that it does not need. Instead of canceling leases and selling the real estate, it’s going to convert them into clean energy spaces.

With enough subsidies, developers will try nearly anything. Then when the projects fail, the developers ask for more money.

How is this Being Paid For?

Taxpayers of course. But Biden is funneling $45 billion from clean energy incentives in the ridiculously named Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) into housing conversions.

You might also be wondering what this has to do with clean energy, and the answer is nothing. The questions keep piling up and I have answers.

What’s Really Going On Here?

Biden is hoping to spread the IRA dollars around to buy more votes.

But to do so, he is taking money away from his other pet projects to fund the idea of the moment. His idea of the moment is to do something about the price of rent.

Biden Trails Trump in Five of Six Battleground States

Polls say Biden is in serious trouble and those polls are very believable for reasons I explain.

For discussion, please see Five Alarm Bell – Biden Trails Trump in Five of Six Battleground States

One of the more amusing stats in the poll is voters under 30 favor Mr. Biden by only a single percentage point. And a majority of voters saying Mr. Biden’s policies have personally hurt them.

Housing helps explain that.

CPI Rises More Than Expected as Rent Jumps Another 0.6 Percent

CPI data from the BLS via the St. Louis Fed, chart by Mish

I repeat the core key theme for something like two years now. People keep telling me rents are falling, I keep doubting.

The doubters have it correct again.

On October 12, I noted CPI Rises More Than Expected as Rent Jumps Another 0.6 Percent

Rent of primary residence, the cost that best equates to the rent people pay, jumped 0.6 percent. Rent of primary residence has gone up at least 0.4 percent for 26 consecutive months!

Supposedly, the price of new leases is declining. But new leases are a small slice of the market. Most people do not move. And the irony is falling prices on new leases makes these conversions increasingly unfeasible without bigger and bigger subsidies.

It is not the wealthy who make up the majority of renters. So rent alone is fueling the pain that shows up in the polls. Factor in food.

A rising stock market and home prices does not help those with no assets. And the poor have no assets.

So Biden is desperate to do something about rent. His funneling of $45 billion from here to there is part of his solution.

He may very well be caught in a Red Queen Race where the more he tries the worse he looks.

Wake Up Mr. President, Consumers Do Not Want Not EVs

On October 16, I commented Wake Up Mr. President, Consumers Want Hybrids, Not EVs

A better title would have been Wake Up Mr. President, Consumers Don’t Want EVs

While the President harps about how great things are, consumers don’t see it that away and I have been covering all the reasons why.

This office to apartment idea is nothing more than throwing money at failed big cities hoping to buy more votes. Since consumers don’t want EV’s Biden’s plan is to quietly shift the spotlight to rent.

Unfortunately for Biden, $45 billion does not buy as many votes as it used to.

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Customers can now access all environmental data in a single platform

SAN FRANCISCO, CA & LONDON, UK, Oct. 30, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Watershed today announced that customers can now use its industry-leading enterprise sustainability platform to measure, report, and manage water and waste data in addition to greenhouse gas emissions data.

The updated functionality allows companies to manage all environmental data in a single platform, enabling better oversight of environmental impact and seamless compliance with regulatory frameworks like the European Union’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD).

Nearly every company in the world owns or leases buildings, and tracking and reducing those buildings’ environmental impact is a key component of corporate sustainability strategies. The new water and waste functionality complements Watershed’s solutions for Scope 1-3 emissions measurement, reporting, and reductions.

“Watershed is one of the first solutions to combine deep emissions measurement with water and waste metrics. Companies now have easy access to the data they need to inform comprehensive ESG reporting and commensurate environmental action,” said Yubing Zhang, Head of Platform Products at Watershed.

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ABOUT WATERSHED: Watershed is the enterprise sustainability platform. Companies like Airbnb, Carlyle Group, Everlane, YETI, and BBVA use Watershed to measure, report, and act on their emissions, so they can produce audit-ready carbon footprints that drive real reductions. With embedded climate intelligence from the world’s leading climate and policy experts, Watershed is the platform of choice for companies seeking to satisfy regulatory requirements, unlock new business opportunities, and address climate-related risks. Watershed customers also have exclusive access to a marketplace of pre-vetted, high-quality carbon projects and groundbreaking virtual power purchase agreements.

CONTACT: Amelia Penniman Watershed amelia@watershed.com

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SAN FRANCISCO — The San Francisco Giants’ offense appeared to wake up Wednesday, and the club should have been well-rested Friday after a long-awaited day off.

They must have hit the snooze button.

Rookie shortstop Marco Luciano recorded his first hit and scored his first run of his career, and Joc Pederson smashed a late solo shot, but the Giants didn’t manage much else Friday night to back up a bounce-back start from Logan Webb in a 3-2 loss to the Boston Red Sox, who ran their winning streak to five games.

Pederson’s home run in the eighth, his 11th of the season, should have tied the score at 2. But the Red Sox widened their lead to 3-1 in the top half of the inning, after manager Gabe Kapler pulled an ultraefficient Webb with one out in the eighth, and Taylor Rogers surrendered an RBI single to the next batter.

Rebounding from the worst start of his career, Webb mostly silenced a lineup that has been the hottest in the majors since the end of June. He was shown shaking his head on the bench after the run scored, more likely lamenting the base runner he left for Rogers than Kapler’s decision to pull him.

Webb didn’t run a three-ball count until the fifth inning and was at only 88 pitches when Kapler came to get him, with Boston’s lineup turning over for a fourth time and a runner at second after a leadoff single and a sacrifice bunt. Pinch-hitter Rob Refsnyder lined the first pitch from Rogers into left-field, driving home Connor Wong for what proved to be a crucial insurance run.

Limiting a dangerous Boston lineup to three runs on six hits, Webb lowered his ERA to 3.49, including a 2.20 mark in 10 starts at Oracle Park. He struck out four and walked none. It should have been enough to earn the win, but the Giants’ lineup returned to its slumber against Red Sox starter Kutter Crawford.

The Giants managed just one other hit off Crawford besides Luciano’s and the RBI single from Michael Conforto that drove him in. Looking to extend their sixth-inning rally after Crawford was lifted for left-handed reliever Brennan Bernardino, Kapler called on Austin Slater to pinch-hit, and he struck out.

In his second major-league game, Luciano recorded his first career hit with a line drive that glanced off the glove of third baseman Rafael Devers to lead off the sixth. The ball left his bat at 107.1 mph. He took second on a wild pitch, putting him in position to score on a single from Conforto.

The Giants were primed to strike again in the seventh, with leadoff singles from J.D. Davis and Patrick Bailey. But, with the help of a sensational diving stop and flip from second baseman Justin Turner, they came up empty. Turner’s diving stop robbed Blake Sabol of an RBI single, and Luciano was called out on strikes to end the inning, stranding Davis at third as the would-be tying run.

The Red Sox, who improved to an MLB-best 16-5 since June 30, possess six of the top nine batters in the AL in that time span. Consider them the polar opposites of the Giants’ ice-cold group, which has produced three or fewer runs in eight of their past nine games and is batting .204 this month (Boston: .299).

Triston Casas accounted for Boston’s first two runs off Webb with two of their six hits, including his MLB-leading seventh home run since the All-Star break.

Casas traded places with Adam Duvall in the second inning with back-to-back ground rule doubles that put Boston up 1-0. Duvall’s was a line drive down the third-base line that just evaded the glove of Davis but eventually found the one of the ball guy, automatically awarding Duvall second.

Manager Alex Cora and a Red Sox trainer came out of the dugout to check on Casas in the fifth after he fouled a two-strike changeup off his shin and fell to the ground. It didn’t take long for Casas to prove he was all right, unloading on Webb’s next pitch for a 435-foot home run that landed halfway up the left-field bleachers.

©#YR@ MediaNews Group, Inc. Visit at mercurynews.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Copyright 2023 Tribune Content Agency.

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The scenario couldn’t have been better, the stage set for the 76ers with a game six at home to end the series against heavy-betting favorites Boston Celtics. The Sixers had gained home field advantage by defeating the Celtics in games one and five in Boston. On the same Thursday evening that tThe Eagles’ 2023 schedule has been released, Taylor Swift is in town too and it was a beautiful day in South Jersey! As the Sixers fans thronged the Wells Fargo Center along with current athletes and Philly celebrities, they were in attendance. What could go wrong? I’ll tell you what went wrong: The Sixers came out flat, shooting an unacceptable 36 percent and making just eight three-pointers in a 95-86 loss. Now the Sixers must return to Boston for Game 7 on Sunday and try to reach their first Eastern Conference Finals in over 20 years on Mother’s Day! Sixers head coach Doc Rivers will make his 16th head coaching appearance in a seventh game of the NBA playoffs; Rivers has a 6-9 record in game seven in his coaching career.

The Phillies have won three straight games, thanks in part to their win over the Toronto Blue Jays in Philadelphia, and are starting a three-game streak against the Rockies in Colorado tonight before traveling to San Francisco to take on the Giants play. The Phillies are currently third in the National League East with a record of 18-19. This is also the SAME record that the Phillies had in their first 37 games at the start of last season!

The Eagles’ 2023 NFL season schedule was released Thursday, and we’ll be taking a closer look at the Birds’ opponents for the upcoming season!

On Saturday’s show: Mike Carlin join me in the studio as we analyze the Sixers’ loss in Game 6 and prepare you for Game 7 against the Celtics on Sunday. Sports book consultant Dave Sharapan calls from Las Vegas. The Book delves into who is the favorite to win the NBA and NHL championships midway through the playoffs. In the second hour we talk Phillies’ Baseball and Eagles’ Football and take your texts on all things Philly Sports at 609-403. 0973.

Josh Hennig will host plus with me on Sunday’s show “The intern” Andrew leads will accompany me in the studio as we prepare for the Sixers’ seventh game on Sunday against rival Celtics in Boston. We go every Sunday “On the hill” with former Phillies pitcher Tommy Greene presented by the John R. Elliott Hero campaign for designated drivers. Tommy discusses the latest developments at the Phillies this season. In the second hour, we’ll continue to prepare you for the afternoon action of the Sixers and Phillies, as well as talk about the Eagles and a couple of Flyers.

All that and more this weekend The Locker Room with Billy Schweim – Tune in every Saturday and Sunday from 10am to 12pm on 973 ESPN South Jersey!

Learn about Cape May County’s breweries (in alphabetical order)

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San Francisco stores all sorts of data about its streets, including where the city gets the most calls for poop. In 2022, an address in the Bayview had an ignominious reputation for being the shittiest in town, and in 2023 it’s back on top, according to 311 hotline stats.

But do the numbers unfairly tarnish the reputation of an address on the corner of Oakdale Avenue and Third Street?

As of January 2022, the address was 1615 Oakdale Ave. Subject to as many as 174 calls to 311 reporting animal or human waste, according to a tally compiled by the city.

But the 311 complaints are actually mostly related to a painted electrical box which is unfortunate to rust at its base. The complaints appear to have been repeatedly filed by the same person, according to the Department of Public Works. Most inquiries sent via SMS contain an identical picture of the rusty signal box.

The painted, rusty box sits on the corner of Oakdale Avenue and Third Street on May 2, 2023 Liz Lindqwister/The Standard

Despite the dual nature of these requests, Public Works continues to send cleaning teams to the site two to three times a week in what department officials say is a “mixture of proactive and 311 service request responses.”

However, the 311 response notes reviewed by the standard repeatedly stated that no human excrement was found at the site and that the “traffic signal has already been steam cleaned.” Another completed 311 report found the area smelled nice, and 17 requests were marked as duplicates, some specifically because public works officials noticed the calls were from the same source.

The box has generated at least 59 reports of human or animal feces since the beginning of this year — that’s about one complaint every other day. And the city continues to allocate resources to it, which raises questions about the effectiveness of the 311 reporting system and how it is used by Public Works.

The Standard recently visited the site on a Tuesday morning and found relatively clear pavement and no excrement. Residents at a nearby condominium complex took their dogs for morning walks, particularly when picking up the animals, and the only litter in sight was a pile of neatly discarded cardboard boxes.

However, the street is not without real cleanliness issues. Almost every day, workers at a nearby restaurant use electricity to flush an alcove next to the restaurant, often used as a toilet, public works officials said. The restaurant owners also say that garbage is constantly lying around their premises.

Operated by Public Works, this pit stop is located in Bayview. There are at least seven of these buildings in the Tenderloin neighborhood, where the street droppings problem is most evident. | Liz Lindqwister/The Standard

“The fact that there is a staffed public restroom nearby suggests the issue may be more complex in terms of the person or persons using that area as a restroom,” the Public Works spokeswoman said , Rachel Gordon.

Public Works and 311 officials say their agencies handled the duplicate calls at Oakdale Ave. Investigate 1615.

The really shittiest street in SF?

Bayview residents said they were surprised to hear the area around Oakdale Avenue and Third Street was a 311 fecal hotspot, but said crime and garbage disposal are on the corner, which is across from a busy Muni station , can be a problem.

In fact, Public Works operates a public restroom known as the Pit Stop near the intersection. The man who runs it, who only wanted to give his first name, Justin, said fecal problems at the Bayview aren’t as intense as in other parts of the city.

“It won’t be as bad as downtown, like the tenderloin,” he said. “That’s where [Pit Stops] really handy.”

Street cleaners from the Department of Public Works clean streets in San Francisco in October 2021. | Sophie Bearman/The Standard

According to 311, some of San Francisco’s most fecal-riddled streets are in the Tenderloin and SoMa neighborhoods. The Tenderloin in particular has publicly struggled to help its growing homeless population and address its filthy streets.

“It’s awful; that street is covered,” said Joe Souza, a Tenderloin resident who has lived on Larkin Street for a year. “There’s poop everywhere. You can always see it on the wall and in front of the garage over there.”

A four-block zone in the tenderloin between Larkin and Taylor streets has seen dozens of 311 fecal-related cleaning requests over the past five months. But residents say the problem is far bigger than what the data shows.

“We’ll clean up five of them [feces] per week,” said Bekzod Ochilov, manager of Halal Dastarkhan, an Uzbek restaurant on the corner of Larkin and Sutter streets. “The government should fine people who do this; We have to keep the city clean.”

The city has responded to concerns about cleanliness in the Tenderloin by instituting new cleaning programs and constructing seven neighborhood pit stops, which may have contributed to the declining calls related to fecal matter in the Tenderloin in 2022. And the neighborhood’s Community Benefit District has responded to thousands of street cleaning requests over the past two years.

But some residents fear that’s not enough, especially when concerns about street cleanliness reflect the city’s persistent problems like homelessness, mental illness and drug use.

REGARD: ‘This Shouldn’t Be Normal’: Tenderloin Parents Deal With Neighborhood Issues

A Clean City in the Tenderloin team member uses electricity to wash the pavement on Hyde Street in the Tenderloin on January 31, 2015. | Paul Chinn/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images

“The poop everywhere is awful, and it’s really everywhere,” said Nina Buthee, a 20-year-old resident of the neighborhood. “If someone shot up or something, we all reported it. But it doesn’t surprise me that there are so many 311 calls.”

So far in 2023, the city has received more than 1,322 calls to remove fecal matter from the tenderloin.

Data can’t tell us everything

Although 311 service calls can highlight areas that may need special attention, the data doesn’t tell the whole story. It can even tempt city officials to waste precious resources on situations like 1615 Oakdale Ave.

The stark difference between Bayview’s most-reported location and a besieged Tenderloin street shows how excessive 911 calls or duplicate requests can skew reality and are only an imperfect gauge for tracking the city’s cleanliness problem.

The propensity to report issues such as trash and fecal matter, for example, seems to vary by neighborhood.

“We’ve seen some geographic issues where some neighborhoods or people are more likely to use the 311 system than other neighborhoods, so it can get a little skewed,” Gordon said. “We know that [311] hasn’t been used that much at the Bayview but there might be an owner, a resident who uses it.”

The corner of Oakdale Avenue and Third Street in San Francisco saw the highest number of 311 fecal-related calls in 2022. | Liz Lindqwister/The Standard

The residents of 1615 Oakdale Ave. did not respond to a request for comment at the time of publication.

As San Francisco continues to complain about dirty streets or feces on its sidewalks, the city is quietly struggling to keep up. The Public Works Department aims to respond to 95% of cleaning requests within two days. However, since January this year, just over three-quarters of street and sidewalk cleaning inquiries have been answered within two days.

According to Gordon, delays are mainly due to a shortage of manpower and the sheer volume of all 311 calls, which range from cleaning requests to parking tickets, and average 60,000 calls per month.

“It’s harder to figure out if [service calls] are duplicate requests or different requests occurring in the same block,” Gordon said. “We are working with 311 to get as much accurate information as possible, but there will be some duplicate requests.”

The post SF Retains Responding to Poop Calls on This Road. Is It a Waste? appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

This is a monthly column that lists five interesting offers each month that may have flown under the radar. Check out last month’s entry here.

After a bumpy first quarter for venture capital, the second quarter is in full swing.

search less. Close more.

Grow your revenue with all-in-one prospecting solutions powered by the leader in private business data.

Let’s look at a handful of rounds that may have been overlooked but have tech that deserves a second read.

Chopsticks upcycled

We all grab those takeout chopsticks on the way out of our favorite Chinese or sushi joint when we’re getting takeout.

But how many of us throw them in the trash after using them?

Canada-based company ChopValue is here to help with some of our environmentally unfriendly eating habits. The startup raised $7.7 million in new funding to support its network of waste-to-resource microfactories.

ChopValue has already saved more than 100 million chopsticks from landfills – by turning what we normally use to scoop Lo Mein into our mouths into sustainably made decorations, kitchen accessories and other products.

The company plans to use the new money to expand into new markets in Asia Pacific and Europe. It’s already testing its microfactories in US cities like Las Vegas and Boston.

While ChopValue started with chopsticks, the company’s model can be used for other types of reuse.

A cyber brain

It sounds a bit like something out of a sci-fi movie, but isn’t that where all the great ideas come from?

Australia-based Cortical Labs, a “bioinformatics startup” that combines lab-grown human brain cells with computer chips, has just raised $10 million in a funding round led by Horizons Ventures.

Cortical Labs plans to use the money to commercialize its biological computer chips – called DishBrain – which have already learned to play basic video games like Pong.

Some think such a development could be the next advancement in AI, as human neurons have some advantages over their digital counterparts.

If all that isn’t scary enough, In-Q-Tel – the venture capital arm of the Central Intelligence Agency – is an investor.

Think about it.

More AI

A list like this is legally required to include at least one generative AI startup, so let’s look at legal AI startup Harvey.

According to an Insider report, the company held an undisclosed round this month valued at $150 million, led by Sequoia Capital.

Although not much was reported about this round, last November Harvey announced a $5 million seed round led by the OpenAI Startup Fund – when AI was just beginning to take off – so it wasn’t long before Raise another round from a big name investor, even in a declining market.

Rather than using AI for sales or marketing purposes, the San Francisco-based startup is deploying it to attorneys, giving them an interface to use AI when processing legal documents or conducting legal research.

The only question now is: What is Harvey’s hourly rate?

A new way of composting

Many of us shovel leftovers down our sink garbage disposal, thinking most of us will just disappear into the ether.

Well, the sad fact is, that’s not the case. In fact, food waste worldwide exceeds 3 billion tons each year, and some cities in North America have imposed garbage disposal bans and made organic waste separation mandatory.

Canada-based company Sepura Home raised a $3.7 million seed round led by sink maker Blanco to solve the growing problem while not further complicating after-dinner cleaning.

The startup has developed a “smart” composter that plugs into the plumbing just under the sink and can effectively separate 99.9% of solid waste that goes down the drain, while allowing liquids to flow through. The waste is stored there in a closed and odorless container until it is removed.

The device will cost around $700 when it starts shipping in a few months.

Can’t you make it faster?

While everyone wants to find ways to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, there are natural methods for storing it in places like the ocean.

However, once absorbed and stored, it takes millions of years to turn into bicarbonate, so the process is a bit slow.

Ebb Carbon of San Carlos, California is trying to make this process a little faster. The ocean-based carbon removal startup raised $20 million Series A through two deals led by Prelude Ventures and Evok Innovations, respectively

Ebb’s proprietary solution accelerates the natural process of alkalization, reducing the ocean’s acidity and restoring its natural chemistry so it can once again absorb more carbon dioxide.

The new money will allow Ebb to deploy its first systems – one with the capacity to remove 100 tonnes of CO2 later this year and a system with a capacity of 1,000 tonnes shortly thereafter.

Figure: Dom Guzman

Stay up-to-date on the latest funding rounds, acquisitions and more with Crunchbase Daily.

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DAVIS (AP) – Banana peels, chicken bones and scraps of vegetables have no place in California trash cans as part of the nation’s largest mandatory food waste recycling program due to come into effect in January.

The goal of the effort is to keep landfills in the most populous US state free of food waste, which will damage the atmosphere as it decays. When food scraps and other organic materials break down, they release methane, a greenhouse gas that is stronger and more harmful in the short term than carbon emissions from fossil fuels.

CONTINUE READING: UPDATE: Person dies after being dragged out of water near China Beach, San Francisco

To avoid these emissions, California plans to begin converting residents’ food waste into compost or energy, making it the second US state to do so after Vermont launched a similar program last year.

Most people in California will be forced to throw excess food in the green waste bins instead of in the trash. The municipalities will then compost the food waste or use it to produce biogas, an energy source similar to natural gas.

“This is the biggest change in waste since recycling began in the 1980s,” said Rachel Wagoner, director of the California Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery.

She added that it is “the easiest and fastest thing any individual can do to influence climate change”.

The California push reflects the growing recognition of the role food waste plays in pollution in the United States, where up to 40% of food is wasted, according to the US Department of Agriculture.

A handful of states and nations, including France, have passed laws requiring grocery stores and other large businesses to recycle excess food or donate it to charities, but the California program targets households and businesses.

The state passed a law in 2016 aimed at reducing methane emissions by significantly reducing the amount of food thrown away. Organic materials like food and garden waste make up half of all California landfills and a fifth of the state’s methane emissions, according to CalRecycle.

As of January, all cities and counties that offer garbage services are said to have introduced food recycling programs and grocery stores will have to donate edible food that would otherwise be thrown on blackboards or similar organizations.

“There’s no need to put this material in a landfill, it’s just cheap and easy,” said Ned Spang, director of the Food Loss and Waste Collaborative at the University of California, Davis.

Vermont, home to 625,000 people compared to nearly 40 million in California, is the only other state that bans residents from throwing their food waste in the trash. According to a law that came into force in July 2020, residents can compost the garbage in their yards, choose to pick it up at the roadside or drop it off at garbage stations. Cities like Seattle and San Francisco have similar programs.

California law requires the state to reduce organic landfill waste by 75% compared to 2014, or from around 23 million tons to 5.7 million tons by 2025.

Most local governments allow homeowners and apartment residents to dispose of excess groceries in garden trash cans, with some placing containers on the countertop to hold the trash for a few days before taking it outside. Some areas may have exemptions for parts of the law, such as rural areas where bears rummage in trash cans.

The food waste is composted or converted into energy through anaerobic digestion, a process that creates biogas that, like natural gas, can be used for heating and electricity.

CONTINUE READING: Family and friends gather to look out for the beloved security guard Kevin Nishita. to remember

But California composting facilities have a strict licensing process to dispose of food waste alongside traditional green waste like leaves, and only a fifth of the state’s facilities currently accept food waste.

The state has also set a goal of diverting 20% ​​of the food that would otherwise end up in landfills by 2025 in order to feed people in need. Supermarkets must start donating their excess groceries in January, and hotels, restaurants, hospitals, schools and large venues will do so from 2024.

The donation portion of California’s law will contribute to a federal goal to cut food waste in half by 2030.

Davis is one of the California cities that already has a mandatory food recycling program. Joy Klineberg, a mother of three children, throws coffee grounds, fruit peels and cooking waste into a metal container with the label “Compost” on her worktop. When preparing dinner, she empties excess food from the cutting board into the rubbish bin.

Every few days she throws the contents into her green waste bin outside, which is picked up and sent to a facility in the district. Unpleasant smells on the countertop were not a problem, she said.

“All you change is where you throw things, it’s just another trash can,” she said. “It’s really easy and it’s amazing how much less rubbish you have.”

Implementing similar programs in larger cities is more difficult.

The two most populous in the state – Los Angeles and San Diego, which together make up about one in eight Californians – are among the cities whose programs won’t be available to all households next month.

That’s because it takes time to buy the necessary equipment, such as green waste bins for households that don’t already have one for garden waste, and facilities to dispose of the material. Garbage collection fees will rise in many places.

Like Davis, CalRecycle wants to focus more on education and less on punishment. Governments can avoid penalties by reporting to the state themselves by March if they haven’t set up programs and outlining plans to launch them. Cities that refuse to do so could be fined up to $ 10,000 per day.

Ken Prue, assistant director of San Diego’s environmental division, said the city invested nearly $ 9 million in this year’s budget to buy more trash cans, kitchen containers, and trucks to carry the extra trash.

Prue hopes that after the program starts next summer, San Diego residents will quickly realize the importance of recycling food waste.

“Hopefully before you know it it becomes second nature,” he said.

© Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

MORE NEWS: COVID: Antioch Diner closed because the health order opposes and is allowed to reopen

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As I walk out of the Luke’s Local grocery chain in San Francisco on a Tuesday night, I feel an unexpected wave of guilt.

In my hand I am holding a heavy brown paper bag that is packed with eight products, a ham and goat cheese sandwich, a loaf of country bread with seeds, a fancy-looking almond cake, two chocolate sea salt biscuits and a packet of pita bread. Somehow I only paid $ 5.99 for this transportation which will feed me in various ways for at least a week.

The pound cake alone has a price sticker that says $ 13.99.

That day, the day I felt like I paid a small fee to rob a bank, I decided to have all of my meals (or at least my food for a 24 hour period) through the new Too Good app To Go, an anti-food waste company that helps bring excess food from restaurants and grocery stores to the general public for only $ 4.99 or $ 5.99 per “surprise bag”.

When I opened the app that morning, I had many San Francisco restaurants and grocery stores to choose from, including many that I would consider downright trendy, like Mamahuhu by Brandon Jew and Indie Superette by Michael Mina. I decided to pick a few that I knew well as I thought this would be my best choice for a well rounded day out based on what I knew the restaurant was in stock. I figured I’d get dinner from the House of Dim Sum, breakfast from Daily Driver, lunch prep from Luke’s Local, and a sweet treat and maybe a loaf of bread from La Boulangerie.

I was very, very wrong. As you can see, any facility can give a customer anything they want in a “surprise bag”. Sometimes the app might describe what’s likely in it (I’ve rarely seen this), but more often all you have to do is guess what they are for. But what I did wrong wasn’t necessarily the contents of the bag (obviously I expected and was right that Daily Driver would give me leftover bagels), but the amount of food in each bag.

While the customer is $ 4.99, each bag should be worth at least $ 15 (or a $ 5.99 bag should be worth $ 18), and each bag that I picked up had at least that and mostly a lot more. My plan for about three meals plus one dessert was actually subsidized meals for me and my husband all week long.

My loot from La Boulangerie included a banana and nut pound cake, a large chocolate chip cookie, a raspberry financier, and a baguette for $ 4.99.

Tessa McLean

At La Boulangerie Noe Valley, my bag contained a banana and nut pound cake, large chocolate chip cookie, raspberry financier, and a baguette for $ 4.99 – probably the most accurate of $ 15 I could get, when I added taxes according to my calculations.

When I pick up my dinner at the House of Dim Sum, I am greeted with a huge to-go container full of spring rolls, shrimp dumplings, pot stickers and Jian Dui, wrapped in such a way that I share it with my husband and there is enough for both dinners – everything for $ 5.99.

I ate Luke’s Local’s sandwich for lunch the next day and used the flatbread to gobble up some hummus that I had in the fridge. And for the rest of the week, I had breakfast – six Daily Driver bagels that typically cost $ 3.50 a bagel. Not to mention the peppers, onions, and garlic I used to complement a taco dinner later in the week, or the baguette pieces I used to soak up pasta sauce during another dinner and the lots of desserts that came from the various biscuits and this very tasty 13.99 pound cake.

Luke’s Local packed a grocery bag full of produce, a ham and goat cheese sandwich, a loaf of country bread with seeds, an almond cake, two chocolate sea salt biscuits, and a box of flatbread – all for $ 5.99.

Tessa McLean

Food waste is a major problem nationwide, but especially in the United States. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, up to 40% of our food is thrown away in this country. A 2014 study by the Food Waste Reduction Alliance found that 84.3% of unused food in American restaurants is disposed of and only 1.4% is donated.

Too Good To Go was born in Denmark and quickly spread to France, the UK, Spain, Germany and the Netherlands in 2016. Co-founder Lucie Basch said they knew the key to restaurant participation is to make the process as simple as possible, which makes the app easy to use and doesn’t require upfront commitments. There is no quota a restaurant has to meet so they can add food whenever they want and as often as they want.

The company charges a flat fee of $ 1.79 per purchase – which is pretty high when you convert it to a percentage (around 35% for a $ 4.99 bag) but pretty low when you Considering that most, if not all, of the foods the restaurant would have generated or no sales to save at all.

For Alexis Liu, owner of Beacon Coffee & Pantry, it’s a win-win for her small business in North Beach. Liu said that there is almost always food left at the end of the day, even if it’s just a bag of pastries, and she is glad that she no longer has to worry about it going to waste. She also said she believes it will introduce them to new customers who may not have visited the store but are now familiar with them and their products.

“Even if it’s just a bag that we sell and the actual amount that we receive [the app] is nominal, better than nothing and better than anything that ends up in a landfill, ”said Liu.

Basch said this is a great value proposition for restaurants, and while I didn’t think of it at first, I totally agree. I probably never would have bought the pitted loaf from Luke or that expensive pound cake, but now I might think twice about it if I ever go to the store again.

In addition to the Bay Area, Too Good To Go is currently available in New York, Boston, Jersey City, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Portland and Seattle. The aim is to add more restaurants in the Bay Area to the platform. The company hopes to launch in LA by the end of the year. The company estimates it has saved more than 72 million meals in 15 countries since its inception, adding up to £ 250 million in food.

Lucie Basch, one of the founders of Too Good To Go,

Courtesy Too Good To Go

Basch said she hopes restaurants and grocery stores can also learn from participating in the app. For example, if a restaurant sees there is always 10 baguettes left at the end of the day, maybe they could bake eight less each day and see if that helps their meal costs.

I promise this article is not sponsored by Too Good To Go, but I was really shocked and delighted with how much food each “surprise bag” contained and the quality of it. There doesn’t seem to be many downsides to consumers. Sure, I got a pear that was way too old to eat, but the bag of groceries was already way too expensive, so I didn’t feel bad composting a pear that would have ended up being composted in the store . Picking up items within a tight time limit can be a chore (the store schedules any time – you might only have a 15 minute window and up to several hours) but if you’re in a neighborhood that gets busy There are busy restaurants participating and you have a flexible schedule; it really isn’t that difficult.

The biggest barrier for many will likely be adhering to dietary restrictions. If you have an extreme allergy, Basch admits that the app is probably not for you as they can never guarantee what’s in a particular bag. They have a filter for vegetarian items but when I clicked that most of the restaurants disappeared from my app. But when I look back at my prey, only one out of four places contained items with meat.

If you’re on a budget, passionate about reducing food waste, and not a picky eater, this app could be exactly the win-win-win app it calls itself.

My dinner at the House of Dim Sum was full of spring rolls, shrimp dumplings, pot stickers, and jian dui – all for $ 5.99.

Tessa McLean

The post Meals waste app Too Good To Go saves leftovers from San Francisco eating places appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

More than 100 years after the California gold rush, developers and city guides filled San Francisco Bay and shrunk it by a third to build farms, highways, airports, and subdivisions.

All of this changed in the 1970s with modern environmental laws. But now, with sea-level rise threatening to cause billions of dollars in flooding over the coming decades, the bay needs to be refilled – but in a different way this time, according to a new scientific report released Tuesday.

Twice the amount of sediment excavated for the Panama Canal is needed to rebuild the bay’s coastline, researchers say, to protect communities in Marin County and elsewhere from catastrophic flooding and rising seas that stretch to the end of the Panama Canal could grow up to 6 feet tall by the century.

The Bay Bridge, which spans San Francisco Bay, can be seen from above in San Francisco on October 9, 2015. More mud and debris is needed to increase the height of the marshes and mud flats that encircle the coast of the bay to combat rising sea levels. (Josh Edelson / AFP via Getty Images)

The best source of this immense fill volume is the mud and mud that are scooped up when the bay’s ports and shipping channels are dredged each year. Currently, however, this material is being dumped into the ocean 60 miles from the Golden Gate or sent to the bottom of the bay near Alcatraz Island.

“We waste too much,” said Barbara Salzman, executive director of Marin Audubon, whose organization is trying to use dredged material for the planned restoration of the Tisconia swamp in San Rafael’s flood-prone canal district.

“We really need to use the sediments as a resource,” said Salzman. “I hope we can use this and get a regional program off the ground.”

The report calls for a radical change in these disposal practices.

“It’s not a waste product. It’s a valued resource. It should be used for the common good, ”said Letitia Grenier, co-author of the report and senior researcher at the San Francisco Estuary Institute, a nonprofit research organization based in Richmond.

The study, titled “Sediment for Survival,” was authored by scientists at the San Francisco Estuary Institute with input from researchers from UC Davis, the US Geological Survey, the Environmental Protection Agency, the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission, and other Bay experts .

The math is pretty simple.

To add 6.9 feet to the wetlands and tidal flats around the bay over the next 80 years, 477 million cubic feet of mud and debris must be added. That corresponds to a load of 48 million dump trucks.

If nothing is done, between 150 and 170 million cubic meters naturally enter the bay from streams, rivers and other sources. This leaves a deficit of around 300 million cubic meters. The good news? Grenier and her colleague Scott Dusterhoff estimate that around 60% of this deficit can be compensated for with mud and mud from dredging. The rest can be produced by scooping out large amounts of sediment trapped behind dams, removing dams, diverting flood protection projects, or relocating internal debris from construction projects in future generations.

Using a waste product to protect the bay from flooding would be a societal shift recognizing that aluminum cans and glass bottles cannot be thrown into landfills or that sewage can be purified and reused for irrigation, said David Lewis, executive director of Save the Bay, an environmental group in Oakland.

“Let’s stop wasting this precious resource and use it to protect our communities and wetlands before sea level rise inundates them,” he said. “There are places where we have to raise dikes and sea walls. But in most parts of the bay we can use the natural infrastructure. And that costs less than sea walls and brings more benefits. “

A flock of herons gathers in wetlands near the west side of Dumbarton Bridge in Menlo Park, California on Thursday, July 23, 2020. (Anda Chu / Bay Area News Group)

These benefits include habitat for birds, fish, and other wildlife, and recreational trails available to the public.

Civil engineer Roger Leventhal of Marin County Flood Control and Protection District said Marin is at the forefront of reusing dredging sludge, sand and other materials for wetland restoration and flood control projects at Novato Creek and for a planned project at Gallinas Creek nearby McInnis Park.

“We agree that sediments must be used wisely to help adjust sea level rise in the Bay Area, and this is something we are already making progress on in Marin County,” said Leventhal.

San Francisco Bay has risen 8 inches since 1900, according to tide gauges. In hotter temperatures, the polar ice caps around the world melt and the volume of sea water increases. Scientists predict the bay will rise by 1 foot or more by 2050 and another 3 feet or more by 2100. Severe winter storms are already causing flooding in some parts of the Bay Area, especially at high tide.

Rising sea levels threatens to flood major transport arteries in Marin, including Highway 101, Highway 37, and cut off communities like Marin City from emergency services and basic needs. Thousands of homes and businesses in bay communities like Mill Valley, San Rafael, Corte Madera and Larkspur could be inundated with water by the end of the century, changing the lives of thousands of residents.

Billions of dollars of infrastructure, including high tech corporate headquarters like Facebook and Yahoo, sewage treatment plants that serve millions of people and communities like Alviso and Foster City, are at risk.

The Facebook offices are located near wetlands in Menlo Park, California on Thursday, March 11, 2021. (Anda Chu / employee archive)

San Francisco International Airport has a $ 587 million plan to build a large new steel and concrete levee around the entire 10-mile perimeter of the airport and its runways, on which 55 annually Millions of passengers are handled. The Santa Clara Valley Water District is working to build earthen levees in parts of the South Bay. And in 2018, San Francisco voters approved a $ 425 million bond to start work on a huge 30-year $ 5 billion project to rebuild the Embarcadero seawall from Giants Stadium to Fisherman’s Wharf to begin.

But around much of the rest of the bay, researchers say, it’s cheaper and more environmentally friendly to increase the size and elevation of wetlands.

Lewis said a key challenge is convincing the Army Corps of Engineers, the federal agency that does most of the dredging, to change its longstanding practices. Dredging materials have been used to haul and pump them on a number of projects, including 648 acres of wetland restoration at Hamilton Airfield in Marin County and 566 acres of restored marshland at Montezuma Slough in Solano County. However, the practice is still in its infancy and some soils contaminated with PCB, DDT and other old toxins cannot be used or need to be buried and sealed.

Another major challenge is the price tag. Disposal of dredged material off Alcatraz costs about $ 10 per cubic meter, about $ 20 in the ocean, and about $ 30 in the Hamilton and Montezuma wetlands, said Jim Haussener, executive director of the California Marine Affairs & Navigation Conference, an organization that represents ports and ports.

Haussener said “beneficial reuse” of dredged spoil is a good idea, but if the federal or state governments fail to provide further funding, he fears that local ports will either not be dredged as often or their fees will rise.

“Everyone supports it,” he said. “The question is who pays?”

IJ reporter Will Houston contributed to this report.

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