Adapted from original post The Innovation Booster funding will help the Canadian companies accelerate food safety, processing, and emissions-reduction projects. GUELPH, ON — The Canadian Food Innovation Network (CFIN) is awarding $294,497 to three foodtech projects through the organization’s Innovation Booster Program. Industry will match these funds, resulting in a total of $588,992 in funding across the three projects.   The Innovation Booster funding recipients are:  Project Lead: Bliq Photonics (Quebec)  Project Title: Coagulation Measurement Probe for the Cheese Industry  Funding: $99,992  Bliq Photonics is proposing a significant advancement for the Canadian dairy industry in cheese manufacturing with a non-contact optical probe designed to monitor cheese production in real-time. Combining advancements in optics, electronics, and software development, this innovative project will allow cheese dairies to better control production processes to optimize production time, yield, and cheese quality.  Project Lead: Harvest Systems Inc. (Ontario)  Project Title: Fryer-based HARVEST System with Ventilation Air Duct Heating Within a Restaurant Environment  Funding: $98,588  Harvest Systems technology collects and recycles waste heat to improve operational efficiency in restaurants and cut greenhouse gas emissions. This project will expand their innovative water-heating HARVEST platform with a new focus on repurposing waste heat from gas-fired fryers to warm incoming ventilation air in restaurants. This fuel-less heating system,

HAMILTON, ON  – Harvest Systems Inc. is proud to announce that they have secured an initial order commitment from Pizza Pizza Limited for its POWER (Pizza Oven Waste Energy Recovery) system following a successful demonstration of the product within the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area. Harvest’s clean technology system, installed and commissioned at three Pizza Pizza locations, enables the restaurants to efficiently manage their energy usage, cut down on operating costs, and reduce emissions. “We are thrilled as a company to be moving from innovation to commercialization,” said Jim Cotton, CEO of Harvest Systems. “We spent the last ten years and $1.7M developing the technology, in collaboration with McMaster University, and we are now in a position to reduce costs and greenhouse gas emissions across the restaurant industry.” Pizza Pizza has committed to 340 units over the next three years, with an initial order of 20 units in Q4 of

By Jennifer A. Kingson, author of Axios What’s Next (Adapted from original post) 2024 will be the U.S. restaurant industry’s biggest year ever in sales — $1.1 trillion by the end of December, per National Restaurant Association estimates. Why it matters: The COVID-19 pandemic devastated the restaurant industry, but sales are now far higher than before it started — and climbing. Driving the news: Total spending at U.S. food service establishments is expected to rise 5.4% this year, to $1.106 trillion, per the National Restaurant Association’s annual “State of the Restaurant Industry” report. To grow their businesses in an increasingly competitive environment, restaurants are looking to technology, social media, and increased catering and delivery options. State of play: There were more than a million unfilled jobs in restaurants and accommodations at the end of March, Korsmo said, citing Bureau of Labor Statistics figures. What they’re saying: “There’s no doubt the future

Adapted from original post BANFF, AB: The finalists of the NGIF Accelerator (NGIF) Global Cleantech Challenge (Challenge) have officially been announced at the International Gas Research Conference (IGRC) 2024 in Banff. The Challenge, operated by the NGIF Accelerator and supported by its Industry Grants member companies, was a funding call to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and startups with clean technology solutions from around the world to lower emissions for natural gas. The finalists of the Challenge were awarded a grant of ~ $6.3MM (CAD) in funding to support the development of their pre-commercial clean technology solution and an opportunity for its validation through a demonstration at one of our member companies to evaluate product market fit. The clean technology categories include Methane Emissions Reduction, Carbon Capture Utilization and Storage (CCUS), Heat and Power Generation, Renewable Natural Gas (RNG), Hydrogen, and Digital Solutions. The funding will provide the necessary support

By Jeff Cowan, President and CEOHamilton Community Enterprises Everyone, everywhere likes to reduce waste. It’s how we conserve resources, save money and prepare for a rainy day. Affordability concerns, uncertainty in energy markets and the growing threat of climate change are all driving us to reduce the amount of energy we consume. This is especially true for the energy used to heat our homes and workplaces. We believe a key solution lies in energy harvesting — the process of capturing and repurposing waste heat. Why are we so interested in energy harvesting? It starts by knowing that in Ontario we waste more than 60 percent of the energy we consume. If we wasted less, we would require less. Efforts to achieve this goal are sparking innovations in heat recovery. These developments are having a positive impact on our economy, society and the environment. Complementary to energy harvesting is the field

The 2% fee is invested in carbon capture to help offset the eatery’s carbon footprint – so I guess we’re just expected shut up and pay it Joe Warmington These friends didn’t realize that not only were they enjoying a great meal in the city’s west end, they were also helping grow back a forest destroyed by fire. Everything served went down well, except for one charge on the bill that no one had seen before. The Lasagna Bolognese at $24 was as first class as the Scaloppine di Vitello at $34. The service at the Goodfellas Wood Oven Pizza on Old Mill Dr. was outstanding – hence the $34.96 tip. Joe Cristiano said the experience with two pals last month was terrific and the bill for $209.76, including tax and tip, was reasonable since also they had wine and dessert. No complaints. But at the bottom of the bill

James (Jim) S. Cotton Most of us who live in the Northern Hemisphere have a fundamental problem: we want to reduce our carbon emissions, but we also need to heat our homes. The good news is there is a way to do both by creating thermal networks. A thermal network is a system of insulated, underground pipes that directly distribute heat to homes and other buildings using heat generated from clean sources — including nuclear reactors. Rather than using their own furnaces, boilers, fireplaces or electric baseboard heaters to heat buildings, consumers would receive heat directly from a utility. It’s an opportunity that is set to grow as Canada expands its nuclear energy supply and creates more heat in the process, especially with small modular reactors expected to start coming on-stream in the next decade. Scaling up Our research collaboration has produced — with the help of experts from McMaster University, The

John Bleasby Across Canada, the number of days that buildings of all sorts require heating far outnumbers those that require cooling. According to data gathered by James Cotton, professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at McMaster University and associate director of the McMaster Institute of Energy Studies, the ratio in Toronto, for example, is about seven to one. Heating requires energy, which in turns creates carbons. A number of projects and initiatives are seeking alternatives that capture, store and reuse what is called “waste heat.” Cotton and fellow researchers from McMaster and Ottawa universities have developed what they call the Integrated Community Energy and Harvesting System, or ICE-Harvest, “a grid modernization solution for cold climates that incites a paradigm shift in virtual power plant design and operation.” The ICE-Harvest strategy results in as much as 50 per cent of all building heating loads being met by energy that is currently

Three McMaster startup companies – HARvEST, A.I. VALI Inc. and Esphera SynBio – have each received $256,000 in the third round of McMaster Seed Fund investments. Co-founded by mechanical engineering professor, James Cotton, and research lab manager at the McMaster Institute for Energy Studies, Jeffrey Girard, HARvEST aims to support decarbonization of the restaurant industry with their fuel-less, carbon-free hot water heating system. The HARvEST platform – developed in collaboration with Pizza Pizza Limited and Thermal Electronics Corporation – was successfully demonstrated in three Ontario Pizza Pizza restaurants this year. The system captures waste heat from cooking appliances, including ovens and fryers, to offset energy consumption in other parts of the restaurant, such as water heating. Cotton and Girard say the Seed Fund investment will support further development and commercialization of HARvEST’s technology in Canada and the US. “Restaurants are energy-intense spaces – they use a considerable amount of electricity,

By Canadian Pizza Hamilton, Ont. – HARvEST Systems has successfully demonstrated its innovative waste heat recovery systems within the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area. The company’s clean technology system, installed and commissioned at three Pizza Pizza locations, enables the restaurants to efficiently manage their energy usage, cut down on operating costs and reduce emissions. Developed through a five-year research program at McMaster University, in partnership with Pizza Pizza Limited, the POWER (Pizza Oven Waste Energy Recovery) system is designed to repurpose waste heat from pizza ovens to offset heating needs within a restaurant and provide autonomous operations and resilience with the ability to generate electricity. The POWER system repurposes waste heat from Pizza ovens to offset heating needs within a restaurant. In parallel, the integrated performance measurement and data analytics provides insight into the subtle energy interactions within a commercial kitchen, thus allowing the ability to monitor system health and