The Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico Sus­tain­abil­ity Stud­ies Pro­gram has received a $1.5 mil­lion grant for an endowed chair in sus­tain­able envi­ron­men­tal food sys­tems and $150,000 in start-up funds from the W.K. Kel­logg Foun­da­tion. The endow­ment will sup­port edu­ca­tion that increases the well-being of stu­dents and cit­i­zens by advanc­ing envi­ron­men­tal sci­ence and social equity applied to the devel­op­ment of local food systems.

Here is a tough call: is this in the Wretched Excess Dept. or the Greenwash watch? Bananas come in the perfect package already, a disposable, compostable skin that doubles as a handy banana holder and instigator of vaudeville humor. But that’s not good enough for Del Monte, which introduces individually wrapped bananas as a “‘Natural Energy Snack on the Go’.” And what were they before?

Before he started “saving the earth, one beer at a time,” all inventor Eric Fitch knew about home brewing was that it could make quite a mess.

Once, he accidentally backed up the plumbing in his apartment building by dumping into his garbage disposal the spent grain left over from his India Pale Ale home brew. The oatmeal-looking gunk choked the pipes in his Cambridge, Mass., building, flooding the basement.

These days, he’s doing something more constructive, fulfilling the dream of beer lovers everywhere by recycling the stuff: The MIT-trained mechanical engineer has invented a patented device that turns brewery waste into natural gas that’s used to fuel the brewing process.

Triple Pundit has been investigating what makes the world’s biggest and smallest companies sustainable for over five years. We’re not ashamed to admit that we often end a long day with a cold one. Beer has often been a catalyst in our discussions and networking, not to mention something we enjoy in our time off.

Now, we’re reaching out to brewers large and small to seek out what “sustainability” means to them, and to help tell the story of “green”, socially conscious brewing.

Follow along with us on this page as we add responses and stories from brewers around the world through January, 2011.

Are you a brewer? Large or small we want to hear from you. Please get in touch with us and we’ll make sure to include your story in our series.

A McDonald’s potato supplier in Austria turns its potato waste into power for the public grid. Another supplier in the U.K. is providing electricity in a different way; it uses wind turbines to run a French fry factory and sells surplus energy to the grid.

Those are just two of the projects McDonald’s has added to its list of best practices, divided into two categories: Best of Green, which are practices created by the company and its stores, and Sustainable Supply, which are from McDonald’s suppliers.

Naya Spring Water will begin using bottles made from 100 percent recycled plastic this month in a move that illustrates the advances made in recycled-content packaging that will likely spread to other companies.

Following about 40 packaging reduction projects in 2008 that reduced Hormel Foods’ packaging by 5.2 million pounds, the company has announced a range of new projects that are expected to cut it’s packaging needs by at least an additional 5.3 million pounds.

Since joining the Coca-Cola Company in 1997, Scott Vitters has gone to work most days with one question on his mind:

“How do we get to our vision of a 100 percent renewable, 100 percent recyclable bottle?”

It’s a simple question, with anything but a simple answer — getting to a renewable, zero-waste bottle requires technology breakthroughs, favorable economics that will drive recycling, changes in human behavior and supporting policy from governments around the country, if not around the world.

This winter, though, Coca-Cola is taking a meaningful step toward its goal with the introduction of what it calls a PlantBottle — a bottle made of PET plastic, 30 percent of which is sourced from Brazilian sugar cane and molasses.

National Academy of Sciences, Leslie Pray and Ann Yaktine, Rapporteurs; Food Forum; Institute of Medicine
http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12633&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+nap%2Fnew+%28New+from+the+National+Academies+Press%29&utm_content=Google+Reader#description

[Description] In the food industry, scientists are exploring the potential of nanotechnology to enhance the flavor and other sensory characteristics of foods, introduce antibacterial nanostructures into food packaging and encapsulate and deliver nutrients directly into targeted tissues, among other applications.

However, as with any new technology, along with the benefits, there is the potential for unanticipated adverse effects. There is still a great deal to learn about any health outcomes related to introducing nanosized materials into foods and food packaging materials. Developing nanotechnology into a safe, effective tool for use in food science and technology will require addressing these and other questions. Assuring consumer confidence will be equally important to the success of this new emerging technology.

The Institute of Medicine held a one-day workshop, summarized in this volume, to further explore the use of nanotechnology in food. Specifically, the workshop was organized around three primary topic areas: (1) the application of nanotechnology to food products; (2) the safety and efficacy of nanomaterials in food products; and (3) educating and informing consumers about the applications of nanotechnology to food products.

Since starting a program for recycling expanded polystyrene foam (more commonly, but not technically, called styrofoam), Pacific Seafood has recycled and sold more than 300,000 pounds of packaging material that it used to toss in the trash.