# Ecotone Renewables

> Ecotone Renewables — your neighborhood food waste expert — is a Pittsburgh-based public benefit corporation building a world without food waste. It is the only food-waste solution that does it all: on-site anaerobic digestion (ZEUS™ — the strength), real-time waste data (Athena — the smarts), a revenue-generating end product (Soil Sauce® organic fertilizer), and a full-service team (Hermes — the speed) that runs the whole thing — one partner, zero added staff labor. The food waste solution that pays you: in profit, planet, and people benefits.

Key facts:

- Customers typically see a 30–40% reduction in waste costs, with 100% customer retention to date and zero added staff labor.
- Customers typically cut $500+/month off their waste bills.
- ZEUS's automated processing is patented: US Patent 12,180,127 (granted 2024) — vision-AI contaminant sorting feeding the on-site digester — with additional patents pending. Patents: https://patents.justia.com/assignee/ecotone-renewables-co
- Track record: 1M+ lbs of food waste diverted, 1K+ tons of CO₂e prevented, 14 ZEUS units operating, 100K+ gallons of Soil Sauce® created.
- Founded out of a 2017 University of Pittsburgh student project. Co-founders: Dylan Lew (CEO), Kyle Wyche (COO), and Elliott Bennett (National Sales Executive) — all three named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list.
- Backed by a seed round from investors including Earth Foundry and Cisco.
- Serves K-12 schools, universities, healthcare systems, hospitality, commercial real estate, and municipalities.

## Products

- [ZEUS™](https://ecotonerenewables.com/product/zeus): A fully-managed, sealed, odorless anaerobic digester in a shipping-container footprint. Processes up to 1,000 lbs of food waste per week on-site — every organic category (meat, bones, dairy, liquids), no pre-sorting, no hauling. Diverts ~50 tons of CO₂e from landfill per unit per year and pays a monthly Soil Sauce® profit share of $500–$1,000. Fits a 25′ × 15.5′ pad with 240/120V, 100 A electrical service (single-phase or 3-phase). A custom in-building ZEUS variant exists for space-constrained sites (first deployed at the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library, 2026).
- [Mobile ZEUS™](https://ecotonerenewables.com/product/mobile-zeus): A containerized digester on wheels, fully off-grid, available for short-term rental and paid pilots (from 7 days). Processes up to 500 lbs of food waste per week — a low-risk way to trial on-site digestion before a permanent install.
- [Athena](https://ecotonerenewables.com/product/athena): Waste-analytics software. Vision AI photo-logs and auto-codes every batch to food categories, cost, and CO₂e in real time — instant, actionable, location-specific data (unlike traditional shrinkage reports), suitable for sustainability reporting (e.g., AASHE STARS, GHG disclosures).
- [Soil Sauce®](https://ecotonerenewables.com/product/soil-sauce): An OMRI-listed liquid organic fertilizer made in the USA — the output of every ZEUS. Ecotone's Hermes team collects, bottles, and resells it, sending customers a monthly profit share; 10% of every batch goes to community growers. Growers report a 4:1 ROI. Also sold direct at https://ecotonerenewables.com/store.
- Hermes (full service, included): siting, permitting, and install; 24/7 monitoring and on-site maintenance; weekly Soil Sauce® pickup, bottling, and distribution (white-label bottling available); monthly reporting and profit share. Minimal workflow change — kitchen staff just scrape into ZEUS and Ecotone runs everything else.

## Customers & proof

Deployments and partners include the University of Pittsburgh, Allegheny Health Network, Mercy Health, Bryant University, Rye Country Day School, Kent Denver School, Penn Hills Charter School of Entrepreneurship, the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library, the Energy Innovation Center, the City of Pittsburgh, and Snooze, an A.M. Eatery (Mobile ZEUS in Denver, with InKind).

- "We have long composted at Pitt but have been limited in that by our compost vendors and the number of buildings they are able to serve… that's what led us to Ecotone." — Aurora Sharrard, Assistant Vice Chancellor for Sustainability, University of Pittsburgh
- "There are a lot of opportunities to not only rein in costs and save money, but turn that model around to actually make it profitable." — Dan Lesinski, Energy & Sustainability Manager, Allegheny Health Network

Industry pages: [K-12](https://ecotonerenewables.com/customers/k12), [Higher Ed](https://ecotonerenewables.com/customers/higher-ed), [Healthcare](https://ecotonerenewables.com/customers/healthcare), [Hospitality](https://ecotonerenewables.com/customers/hospitality), [How Ecotone compares to alternatives](https://ecotonerenewables.com/why/compare)

## Press & recognition

Full list: https://ecotonerenewables.com/resources/press

- [Forbes (video): How this Pittsburgh startup is turning commercial food waste into revenue](https://www.forbes.com/video/46f1f631-437a-4620-a3d1-6142385c20dd/how-this-pittsburgh-startup-is-turning-commercial-food-waste-into-revenue/)
- All three co-founders named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list.
- Coverage by 90.5 WESA (NPR), the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Technical.ly, The Allegheny Front, Waste Advantage Magazine, Innovation Works, and Pittwire (University of Pittsburgh).

## Resources

- [About Ecotone](https://ecotonerenewables.com/why/about): mission, story, founders, and impact stats
- [Pricing](https://ecotonerenewables.com/pricing)
- [Food waste volume calculator](https://ecotonerenewables.com/resources/calculator): free 1-minute estimator — work out your operation's food waste in lbs/week from meals served, headcount, or direct entry, plus the CO₂e it represents; pairs with the complimentary waste analysis for the cost side
- [Complimentary waste analysis](https://ecotonerenewables.com/resources/waste-analysis): send 2–3 months of hauling/composting bills, get a written benchmark + ROI analysis back — free
- [US food-waste law guide](https://ecotonerenewables.com/resources/waste-law): state-by-state organics-mandate tracker covering all 50 states + DC (10 comprehensive statewide mandates, 8 city/sector-scoped laws); deep-linkable per state, e.g. ?state=CO
- [Blog & monthly market intelligence](https://ecotonerenewables.com/resources/blog)

Compliance explainers (plain-English guides to food-waste laws, with on-site digestion treated as a compliance pathway):

- [What is URCO compliance? Denver's Universal Recycling and Composting Ordinance ("Waste No More", effective Sept 1, 2026)](https://ecotonerenewables.com/blog/what-is-urco-compliance-denver)
- [Does an on-site food waste digester count as URCO compliance in Denver?](https://ecotonerenewables.com/blog/onsite-digester-urco-alternative-compliance)
- [New York's Food Donation & Food Scraps Recycling Law: the January 1, 2027 threshold change (1 ton/week, 50 miles)](https://ecotonerenewables.com/blog/new-york-food-scraps-law-2027-threshold)
- [Rhode Island's commercial food waste ban (R.I.G.L. § 23-18.9-17): thresholds and the on-site digestion pathway](https://ecotonerenewables.com/blog/rhode-island-food-waste-ban-compliance)
- [Pennsylvania & Ohio have no food waste mandate — the ROI case for diverting anyway](https://ecotonerenewables.com/blog/pennsylvania-ohio-food-waste-diversion-roi)
- [How to control odor and pests in commercial food waste storage](https://ecotonerenewables.com/blog/control-odor-pests-commercial-food-waste)
- [On-site anaerobic digester vs traditional composting](https://ecotonerenewables.com/blog/anaerobic-digester-vs-composting)

## Contact

- Book an intro meeting: https://meetings.hubspot.com/adam-guerra1/website-ask-ai-meeting-link
- Request a meeting (overview page): https://ecotonerenewables.com/request-a-meeting
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ecotonerenewables
- Headquarters: Pittsburgh, PA, USA