Candy waste and cow manure sounds like a nasty pairing, but the combo will be used to brew ethanol thanks to a Waco, Texas start-up called EQMA.
The company, which has received $250,000 in funding, will create 500,000 to 2 million gallons of alcohol each year using grocery store and bakery food waste, as well as leftovers from Waco's Mars Snackfood plant.
Eventually, EQMA wants to expand into dairy-heavy Erath County. The company hopes to build microdistilleries on dairies to convert manure into ethanol fuel. Once EQMA receives a US Department of Energy grant, the company plans on building a demonstration manure-to-ethanol plant at Tarleton State University's model dairy.
A company called Microgy already takes manure from Erath County and converts it to methane , but EQMA is convinced that energy recovery will be greater and transportation costs will be lower with ethanol conversion.