
Maine Beer Company wins Green Restaurant Award
Apr. 22—Maine Beer Company was recently named "Greenest Independent Restaurant" in the Green Restaurant Association's annual awards program.
The awards recognize restaurants from among the 1,200 North American restaurants that the association has certified as "green," for taking significant steps to ensure sustainability through measures like water conservation, energy efficiency and waste reduction. Maine Beer Company was chosen for their award category from the roughly 100 independent restaurants in the association's stable of certified green venues.
The association credited the Freeport-based Maine Beer Company with "making significant strides" in energy conservation by using "Energy Star appliances, occupancy sensors, 100% LED lights, on-site renewable solar energy that generates over 37% of its energy usage, and more."
A non-profit organization based in Boston, the Green Restaurant Association has been certifying the environmental friendliness of restaurants throughout North America since 1990. The organization launched its awards program in 2018, with categories that include the Sustainable Food Award, Greenest Small Chain, Greenest University Restaurant and Greenest National Park Restaurant.
Maine Beer Company is one of the association's two certified green restaurants in Maine, along with The Great Impasta in Brunwsick.
Copy the Story Link
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Business Wire
an hour ago
- Business Wire
IQM's State of Quantum 2025: Quantum Industry Must Solve Talent Shortage and Software Platforms, Not Just Qubits
ESPOO, Finland--(BUSINESS WIRE)--IQM Quantum Computers in collaboration with analyst firm Omdia (LON:INF), today unveiled the third edition of its State of Quantum Report, revealing that the quantum industry must address talent shortages and software development kits (SDK) gaps in order to scale beyond just qubit count. As quantum computing shifts from theoretical promise to practical integration, the report projects that the global quantum computing market will reach over $22 billion by 2032 as commercial deployments accelerate. The findings also show that 75% of respondents believe that defining the right applications is the most critical factor for adoption. As Dr. Jan Goetz, Co-CEO and Co-founder of IQM, noted in his foreword, 'Quantum's promise is clear, but fulfilling it requires orchestrated progress across the hardware and software stack—transforming these powerful machines from niche tools into drivers of real-world outcomes.' The report also argues that progress hinges on synchronising hardware industrialisation with software platform maturity. Today, software development kit fragmentation hampers portability and slows adoption in multi-vendor settings. HPC, Quantum, and AI Integration The report also highlights how high-performance computing (HPC), quantum computing, and AI are converging to drive the next wave of growth. According to industry experts, investors, and users across Europe, North America, Asia, and Oceania interviewed, HPC provides the robust infrastructure and orchestration needed to integrate quantum systems into real-world environments, ensuring that quantum and classical resources work in harmony. This synergy promises to accelerate adoption, amplify returns for early adopters, and transform quantum computing from a niche capability into a trusted part of the broader scientific and industrial toolbox. 'Our interviewees identified three major challenges – one is getting to the level of reliability where quantum computers can be considered industrial products rather than crafted laboratory devices, another is improving the software layer to provide the sort of developer experience we see in the high-level frameworks used for AI, and a third is helping users identify opportunities to benefit from quantum computer and set up their experiments. Interestingly, the interviewees are expecting multiple quantum technologies to co-exist, with a degree of specialisation between them,' said Alexander Harrowell, Principal Analyst, Advanced Computing at Omdia. Key Findings and Market Trends Sector Readiness: 57% of survey respondents placed drug-discovery and molecular-modelling workloads as their top quantum priority list, ahead of finance and chemicals. Funding: After a dip in 2023, venture funding surged again in 2024, with 58% of cumulative quantum venture funding still flowing to North American firms, with average deal sizes ($38M) triple those in Europe ($12M). Challenges Ahead: Talent shortages in quantum and growth-stage funding outside the US are the two biggest systemic risks to the industry's continued growth. In addition, the report also calls for three critical priorities to turn these insights into tangible outcomes: Better Abstraction Layers: Bridging the gap between the physics of qubits and the practical problems that matter to businesses. Unified Orchestration and Scheduling: Enabling quantum and classical HPC resources to operate seamlessly together. Cross-Disciplinary Collaboration: Fostering teams that blend quantum expertise, domain knowledge, and software development—creating a new generation of problem-solvers. Download the full report here: State of Quantum 2025 Report. About IQM Quantum Computers: IQM is a global leader in superconducting quantum computers. IQM provides both on-premises full-stack quantum computers and a cloud platform to access its computers. IQM customers include the leading high-performance computing centres, research labs, universities and enterprises which have full access to IQM's software and hardware. IQM has over 300 employees with headquarters in Finland and a global presence in France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Poland, Spain, Singapore, South Korea and the United States.


USA Today
9 hours ago
- USA Today
Whole Foods' distributor hit with cyberattack; stores could see supply issues
Whole Foods' distributor hit with cyberattack; stores could see supply issues A major food distributor that supplies items to Whole Foods and other grocers was hit with a cyberattack that could impact supply at some stores. North American wholesale distributor United Natural Foods said Monday, June 9 that unauthorized activity in its systems forced it to take some of them offline. Forensics experts and law enforcement are both investigating, the company said in a statement. "We are assessing the unauthorized activity and working to restore our systems to safely bring them back online. As we work through this issue, our customers, suppliers, and associates are our highest priority. We are working closely with them to minimize disruption as much as possible," the statement reads. The company said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that the incident "has temporarily impacted the company's ability to fulfill and distribute customer orders" since it was discovered by the company on Thursday, June 5. A Whole Foods spokesperson said the supermarket chain is working to restock its shelves as quickly as possible and said it apologies for any inconveniences to customers. One X user visiting a Whole Foods store said the shelves were empty, along with signs apologizing, adding "It reminds me of when the pandemic first hit." In a Reddit post, one user shared a picture of primarily empty refrigeration shelf with a paper sign attached. "We are experiencing a temporary out of stock issue for some products," the sign reads. "We apologize for the inconvenience and should have your favorite products back in stock soon." Cyberattacks threatening grocery, retail businesses nationwide Grocery and retail businesses across the U.S. and the U.K. have been subject to rising ransomware attacks, according to Keith Wojcieszek, the global head of threat intelligence for risk and financial firm Kroll. Data exfiltration and ransomware attacks have targeted the retail sector in an effort for bad actors to receive large monetary payouts, according to Kroll. Last month the firm tracked at least 16 ransomware posts targeting retail organizations through extortion efforts. "The biggest question right now is who's behind the chaos and disruption of these cyberattacks. Unfortunately, it's not an easy one to answer as hackers have become increasingly interchangeable and decentralized, without a clear organizational structure," Wojcieszek said in a statement to USA TODAY. Wojcieszek added that the retail sector is highly exposed to these attacks because of its reliance on digital systems. Other U.S. retailers have been targeted recently including Victoria's Secret temporarily shutting down its website due to a security threat and Adidas reportedly falling victim to a third party data breach.


Boston Globe
10 hours ago
- Boston Globe
Shoppers are wary of digital shelf labels, but a study found they don't lead to price surges
Social media is filled with warnings that grocers will use the technology to charge more for ice cream if it's hot outside, hike the price of umbrellas if it's raining or to gather information about customers. Advertisement Democratic US Senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Bob Casey of Pennsylvania fired off a letter to Kroger last fall demanding to know whether it would use its electronic labels as part of a dynamic pricing strategy. Lawmakers in Rhode Island and Maine have introduced bills to limit the use of digital labels. In Arizona, Democratic state Representative Cesar Aguilar recently introduced a bill that would ban them altogether. A study published in late May found 'virtually no surge pricing' before or after electronic shelf labels were adopted. The study was authored by Ioannis Stamatopoulos of the University of Texas, Austin, Robert Evan Sanders of the University of California, San Diego and Robert Bray of Northwestern University The researchers looked at prices between 2019 and 2024 at an unnamed grocery chain that began using digital labels in October 2022. They found that temporary price increases affected 0.005 percent of products on any given day before electronic shelf labels were introduced, a share that increased by only 0.0006 percentage points after digital labels were installed. Advertisement The study also determined that discounts were slightly more common after digital labels were introduced. Economists have long wondered why grocery prices don't change more often, according to Stamatopoulos. If bananas are about to expire, for example, it makes sense to lower the price on them. He said the cost of having workers change prices by hand could be one issue. But there's another reason: Shoppers watch grocery prices closely, and stores don't want to risk angering them. 'Selling groceries is not selling a couch. It's not a one-time transaction and you will never see them again,' Stamatopoulos said. 'You want them coming to the store every week.' Electronic price labels aren't new. They've been in use for more than a decade at groceries in Europe and some US retailers, like Kohl's. But they've been slow to migrate to US grocery stores. Only around 5 percent to 10 percent of US supermarkets now have electronic labels, compared to 80 percent in Europe, said Amanda Oren, vice president of industry strategy for North American grocery at Relex Solutions, a technology company that helps retailers forecast demand. Oren said cost is one issue that has slowed the US rollout. The tiny screens cost between $5 and $20, Oren said, but every product a store sells needs one, and the average supermarket has 100,000 or more individual products. Advertisement Still, the US industry is charging ahead. Walmart, the nation's largest grocer and retailer, hopes to have digital price labels at 2,300 US stores by 2026. Kroger is expanding the use of digital labels this year after testing them at 20 stores. Whole Foods is testing the labels in nearly 50 stores. Companies say electronic price labels have tremendous advantages. Walmart says it used to take employees two days to change paper price labels on the 120,000 items it has in a typical store. With digital tags, it takes a few minutes. The labels can also be useful. Some have codes shoppers can scan to see recipes or nutrition information. Instacart has a system in thousands of US stores, including Aldi and Schnucks, that flashes a light on the digital tag when Instacart shoppers are nearby to help them find products. Ahold Delhaize's Albert Heijn supermarket chain in the Netherlands and Belgium has been testing an artificial intelligence-enabled tool since 2022 that marks down prices on its digital labels every 15 minutes for products nearing expiration. The system has reduced more than 250 tons of food waste annually, the company said. But Warren and Casey are skeptical. In their letter to Kroger, the US senators noted a partnership with Microsoft that planned to put cameras in grocery aisles and offer personalized deals to shoppers depending on their gender and age. In its response, Kroger said the prices shown on its digital labels were not connected to any sort of facial recognition technology. It also denied surging prices during periods of peak demand. 'Kroger's business model is built on a foundation of lowering prices to attract more customers,' the company said. Advertisement