Dive Brief:

• As many municipalities, waste management and recycling companies canceled services due to extremely cold temperatures and treacherous road conditions, transportation officials were devising innovative solutions to clear icy roads.

• Due to arctic temperatures, traditional methods for clearing roadways were not effective, so road crews began using whatever was readily available to manage roads- including cheese brine, juice from sugar beets, molasses and potato juice.

• The alternative solutions are seen as both environmentally friendly and cost effective.

Dive Insight:

Officials in some cities are contemplating using these sustainable resources as permanent replacements for the traditional calcium chloride. These natural ingredients are believed to actually be more effective than the 70 cents per gallon liquid salt and, in most cases, are free.

At a time when food waste is becoming a national issue, using leftover waste from food would seem like a smart choice. Jeffrey Tews, a fleet operations manager in Milwaukee, Wisconsin said "We're taking a product that normally would have been disposed of and repurposing it." Food waste is already being transformed into glass and converted into heat for homes, and with the amount of organic waste being produced, municipalities are seeking alternative solutions to disposing of food into landfills.