NEWS & DEVELOPMENTS

Rosalie Bingham, however, sees a brighter future for your food waste — one that might come back to work in your favor. Bingham, a fourth-generation Nevadan and the founder of Regener8tive, a nonprofit that assists environmental projects, recently launched “The Green Machine Initiative,” an environmental project to increase renewable energy in Las Vegas by converting organic waste into power and water.

GREEN MATTERS: How did you arrive at the anaerobic digester concept?   ROSALIE BINGHAM: I was approached by a company to get involved because they knew that I have connections and live both in the north and the south, in Las Vegas and in Reno. They presented some information about organic waste and how it could be used to power the lights and the casinos. And I thought, what a great solution. You take a serious problem — Vegas has one of the largest landfills in the nation — and we solve that problem by taking this organic waste which will lengthen that landfill by 40 years and clean up our air in the valley. It’ll also feed 44 million tourists, which is what creates the problem. But if we utilize that problem and turn it into a solution, then it's a good bet basically.