The Future of Composting
"David Aldridge brought something to show the Planning and Zoning Commission last Thursday ― a bag of dirt" wrote Claire Bessette in The Day this past January.
"The bag contained compost created from a pilot food waste composting operation at the Stonington transfer station. Aldridge, the executive director of the Southeastern Connecticut Regional Resources Recovery Authority, brought the material to show the [Preston] PZC the success of the pilot to create the type of commercial grade material that would be produced at a proposed food waste composting facility on the grounds of the Preston incinerator."
About 20% of Stonington residents contributed to the pilot program, generating over nine tons of food waste every month, parsed up into little green bags of 10+ pounds each that were picked up curbside every week by F.E. Crandall's recycling trucks. Crandall's abrupt retirement earlier this year left Stonington holding the bag, so to speak, but our new hauler CWPM agreed to honor the curbside food waste pickup agreement until June 30. Which is next month (read on for what to do about it.)
Just last month, SCRRA was awarded a Materials Management Infrastructure grant for $4,500,000 from CT DEEP. According to Aldridge, "This funding will support the construction of the SCRRRA food waste composting facility [in Preston], which is designed to divert thousands of tons of organic material out of the solid waste stream, resulting in significant financial savings for our municipalities in the face of Connecticut’s skyrocketing disposal costs."
Disposal costs are mostly measured by weight. A lot of people who did the Stonington pilot program were happily surprised by the serious heft of our green bags full of scraps and peels and grounds — and the corresponding lightness and lower volume of our expensive yellow bags. Trash haulers pay Tipping Fees to unload at landfills and transfer stations, so diverting the heavy food waste helps them lower costs. Lifting those green bags every week was proof in hand.
Congratulations to all Stonington residents who made the pilot such a success!
Higher up our food chain, Stonington has institutional and commercial kitchens that generate large volumes of food scraps. They have been subject to CT's Commercial Organics Recycling Law since 2014, which is "intended to reduce waste and promote the development of source-separated organic material (SSOM) diversion and processing infrastructure in Connecticut by requiring large commercial generators to reduce the generation of wasted food through efficiency improvements, donating surplus food or collecting and diverting food waste from the waste stream to composting, anaerobic digestion, or other organics processing facilities." This has been a CT legislative concern for over a decade.
Compliance with the law is getting tougher. "In 2024, the law required commercial food wholesalers or distributors, industrial food manufacturers or processors, supermarkets, resorts or conference centers located within 20 miles of a permitted source-separated organic material composting facility and generating an average projected volume of at least 26 tons per year of source-separated organic materials (SSOM) to: (1) separate the SSOM from other solid waste; and (2) recycle the material at a permitted SSOM composting facility that has available capacity and is willing to accept them."
Preston is 18.2 miles up Route 2 from Stonington, give or take. The law is revisited yearly to refine compliance thresholds. When the law began, the threshhold for compliance was over 104 tons. Now it's at 26 tons, and more commercial operations are subject to it. Fortunately, some professional haulers are seeing the opportunity here to make it work for all involved. After I watched a pickup at our Velvet Mill by a truck branded Blue Earth Compost, I reached out to the company to find out more.
Sam King, CFO of Blue Earth Compost, told me they presently serve Mystic Aquarium, Masonicare and Zest Fresh Pastry in the Velvet Mill. While the Aquarium and Masonicare likely come under the CT threshold for SSOM legal compliance, I had to conclude (without talking to owners Erin and Gabriella) that Zest does it because it is simply the right thing to do. That perspective remains a driving force, but as King shared:
"Unlocking food scraps from the waste stream is something we've worked hard at doing for over ten years. We've done so by doing our best to meet the needs of our partners. In the case of municipalities, as well as businesses, the guiding question has and will continue to be, how do we divert enough material from the waste stream to make these efforts worth it, fiscally and not just environmentally? The simple answer is volume, density, and working with a partner that knows what they're doing and does it for the right reason. That's just the simple answer though, and life, as you well know it, is rarely simple." Learn more about Blue Earth Compost here.
The oft-touted "circular economy," which aims to convert waste streams to drivers of sustainability, is way more complicated than it sounds. The sheer variety of our trash — metals, glass, cardboard, chemicals, fabrics, plastics galore — is daunting, which is one reason why food waste composting, with it's relatively simple ingredients and natural processes, is now attracting serious attention from investors, policy makers and industry. Last July, BioCycle, a respected industry publication since 1960, reported on a Research and Analysis Report from Closed Loop Partners titled "Unleashing the Economic and Environmental Potential for Food Waste Composting in the U.S.: A Guide for Investors, Policymakers and the Compost Industry." A key takeaway:
"Less than 4% of the 66 million tons of total food waste generated by Americans annually is composted in the U.S. This gap presents a critical opportunity for investors, policymakers and the composting industry."
STONINGTON TRANSFER STATION UPDATES
What do I do with food scraps after June 30? There is a dedicated hopper bin for your green bags at the Transfer Station, just past the yellow bag dumpster and next to the electronics drop off area.
The new bins from CWPM are too big for me! The Town of Stonington, in collaboration with CWPM, is now able to offer 48-gallon trash and/or recycling carts for residents who would benefit from a smaller size. This change reflects the ongoing work of our solid waste team and our new hauler to adapt and improve services based on community feedback.
To request a smaller cart, please call 860-535-5093, a dedicated voicemail line specifically for cart requests. You can also submit your request using the following link: https://forms.gle/Y9DwDQfwZau4VTwj7. If you choose to downsize to a 48-gallon bin, you will not be able to switch back to a 95-gallon bin later without incurring a fee.
How do I know what to recycle? Here's all you need to know!