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Marin Sanitary Service (MSS) is rolling out Marin County’s first pilot residential food waste composting program to help prevent the release of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and keep even more waste from going to the landfill.

Twenty five percent of the food prepared in the U.S. each year is thrown out – approximately 96 billion pounds. In landfills, food scraps decompose releasing methane, a GHG twenty times more potent than CO2.

“We are always working towards the goal of zero waste. This program has been a dream of ours for some time. We look forward to moving out of the pilot phase to include all of our service areas in Marin County,” said Patty Garbarino, President of MSS.

The pilot program will allow residents in the following service areas to put food scraps into their yard waste canisters starting in April: Sleepy Hollow, Oak Manor and Bolinas Ridge. The program will be rolled out in other areas over the next several months. Please look for new stickers and flyers on your yard waste canister.

MSS contracts with these cities are designed to give MSS the ability to innovate and develop new programs to drive Marin County to zero waste. If the pilot program is a success it will be expanded to include more service areas. {We were just "rolled out" last week here in San Rafael}

The collected food scraps and green waste will be ground and mixed at the Marin Resource Recovery Center. The mix will then be sent to Northern Recycling Compost in Zamora, CA, where it will be composted and then returned to MSS as “Marin’s Own” soil amendment. To increase efficiency, every measure will be taken to ensure that the transport trucks are filled in both directions.

MSS rolled out a pilot food compost program for restaurants and businesses in San Rafael in 2008. To expand into residential areas is a natural progression for MSS. Food scraps collected from businesses and restaurants are composted at MSS in a bio-cell that uses revolutionary carbon neutral in-vessel technology, which prevents the release of GHGs.

The resulting material from both ventures is an environmentally friendly nutrient-rich soil amendment. The soil amendment will be given away at MSS in May. Well-managed composting results in increased soil carbon storage, and end use of the soil amendment results in reduced demand for water, fertilizer and other soil inputs. http://www.marinsanitary.com/releases.php

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In 2006, The Marin County Hazardous and Solid Waste Management Joint Powers Authority (JPA) passed a Zero Waste resolution on November 9, 2006 and the County of Marin joins the JPA, which represents the eleven cities and towns of Marin and the County of Marin, in adopting the goal of 80% landfill diversion by 2012 and a Zero Waste Goal by 2025.

The California Integrated Waste Management Act of 1989 (AB 939) required all California jurisdictions to achieve a landfill diversion rate of 50% by the year 2000, and to reduce, reuse, recycle; and to compost all discarded materials to the maximum extent feasible before any landfilling or other destructive disposal method is used. The County of Marin has exceeded the requirements of AB 939 and achieved a 77% diversion rate by 2004.

Strategies to reach zero waste can help to promote the over-arching goal of each generation leaving less of an ecological footprint on the earth. In 2001 the California Integrated Waste Management Board set a goal of Zero Waste in its strategic plan for the state; and cities, councils, counties, and states worldwide have adopted a goal of achieving zero waste, including the counties of San Francisco, Santa Cruz, San Luis Obispo, and Del Norte in California; the cities of Palo Alto, Oakland and Berkeley in California, Seattle in Washington, Toronto in Canada, and Canberra in Australia; and the state of New South Wales in Australia; and 45% of New Zealand’s local government councils. http://www.californiagreensolutions.com/cgi-bin/gt/tpl.h,content=297 globally, act locally"; this is to me a perfect example.

Then there's the issue of styrofoam:

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Certain to-go containers could get the heave-ho if a California bill is passed into law.

A bill has been introduced in California that would ban restaurants, grocery stores and other vendors from packaging food in non-biodegradable Styrofoam containers beginning in 2016. The bill was introduced by Democratic state Senator Alan Lowenthal in an effort to reduce litter from take-out food. Though many California cities have similar bans on the non-biodegradable containers, if passed into law this bill would be the first state-wide measure against Styrofoam in the U.S.

The California Chamber of Commerce calls the bill a "job-killer", saying that banning Styrofoam would not only cut manufacturing jobs from plants in California that produce Styrofoam, but also force many businesses to increase their costs for packaging. (Some businesses report that hot items often require two biodegradable containers so food doesn't leak through.) Other critics of the bill also point out that Styrofoam doesn't cause litter — litterers cause litter. http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/08/30/california-lawmakers-might-ban-sty
rofoam-containers/, the Crazy Californians are at it again. It's not that simple, of course; I would like to know the cost of biodegradable packaging and how much more expensive using two of them periodically on hot food would be. Nobody is surprised the Chamber is against it, we know how closely they are affiliated with the GOP and are blind to anything but business profits. So I don't take their opposition seriously, except if they get the money and power to implement it!

Biodegradable containers aren't free of carbon footprint, either. Maybe they just have to be the first step forward, like cloth grocery bags or something, but they have their negatives:

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Biodegradable plates are typically made from bagasse, which is a material that is made from sugar cane. This is a widely available renewable and sustainable resource. Biodegradable plates made from bagasse will decompose over time and do not have the same negative impact on the environment as non-biodegradable plates and other containers.

While there are environmental benefits with biodegradable plates, food containers and plastic bags, there are also drawbacks. The fact that they are disposable means that there has been an investment in energy and resources to make an item that is only to be used once. Even if the materials are from a sustainable resource, the energy used in manufacturing, delivery to a store, delivery to a home and in waste disposal still needs to be taken into account. It could be argued that a more environmentally friendly option is resusable plates and other containers. While these may not have the flexibility and convenience of disposable items, reusable items can work out to be more cost effective as well as reduce waste. http://greenliving.lovetoknow.com/Benefits_of_Using_Biodegradable_Plat
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