2025 ReFED Food Waste Solutions Summit

Sydney Thayer is a Pollution Prevention Specialist at the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, where she supports Virginia’s new Food Rescue and Composting Program. Funded by the Environmental Protection Agency, this program aims to reduce methane emissions by investing in edible food recovery and composting programs at colleges, universities, and state agencies in the Commonwealth.

Sydney is a recent graduate of the College of William & Mary, where she studied sustainable development and environmental policy. She started college during the COVID-19 pandemic and became passionate about combatting food waste after watching compostable take-out containers and leftover food pile up in the dumpsters outside of her freshman year dorm. After that, Sydney spent her undergraduate years working to prevent food waste and develop the university’s composting program by coordinating between her roles in student government and her job as a dining sustainability intern.

Before joining DEQ, Sydney continued to support W&M's sustainability efforts, including re-establishing their green grants program. She is excited to be a part of Virginia’s newest efforts to reduce food waste and is hopeful that this program will inspire a new set of creative solutions to combat food waste on campus and beyond.