Overview
Saving Organic Material From Becoming Landfilled
Over 50% of all materials being sent to landfills are compostable. These organic materials have the power to restore our soils and benefit our atmosphere when composted. When landfilled, these same materials directly contribute to greenhouse gases that are polluting our air and contributing to climate change. AgRecycle's organic diversion services prevent compostable materials from becoming landfilled waste and transforms them into beneficial soil amendments to rejuvenate American soils from farms to your backyard.
Organic Recycling Offerings
Consulting
- Organic Waste Audits
- Custom Composting Systems
- Waste Reduction Strategy
Kitchen Door Disconnect
Do you understand the full impact of the food cycle once the plate has crossed the threshold out of the restaurant kitchen?
Composting
The Power of Composting
Americans generate more solid waste than any other population, and an overwhelming majority of this waste is sent directly to landfills. Unfortunately, Pennsylvanians are among the most wasteful.
Sadly, over 50% of landfill waste is compostable material that could have been used to renew our nutrient-deficient soils. Instead, it’s creating larger landfills that deplete the ozone layer, adding harmful emissions to an already polluted sky (cars aren’t the only culprit).
Diverting compostable materials to AgRecycle shrinks our pollution burden and restores one of our most strained resources - soil. Using compost that has been produced with scientific best practices improves the physical, chemical and biological properties of soil. This means healthier plants, more nutritious edible crops, and soils that can support more American-grown crops.
The Facts
To date, AgRecycle is very proud to have helped serve a customer base to divert:
3,461,810
CUBIC YARDS of yard debris
227,429
CUBIC YARDS of herbivore manure with bedding
1,209,234
CUBIC YARDS of food waste
From the community
Recent Blogs
The
Kitchen Door Disconnect Dozen
There is a prevalent notion that sustainability and good environmental stewardship seems to be a very confined notion. It stops on the inside of the kitchen door. Are you portrayed below as a one-sided thinker or do you understand the full impact of the food cycle once the plate has crossed the threshold out of the kitchen?
On the inside
of the kitcheh door
My goal is to run this kitchen with sustainability at the forefront.
- In my establishment, we make the effort to donate uneaten food, when possible.
- In this commercial kitchen, I believe earth friendly practices are valued and used regarding its operation.
- My preference in purchasing food is to buy organic.
- When possible, my first choice is to buy food from local growers.
- I know that supporting independent and small food producers has a multi-tiered benefit on the local economy and on community viability.
- I understand the future management of climate change will be the defining issue for my generation on global sustainability.
- I recognize that buying locally produced organic food may cost more than mass produced non-regional items.
- The patrons of my kitchen and I mutually value the sourcing of local organic food and are willing to support the local economy for this outcome.
- I know that healthy, nutrient rich, and chemically free soil is the key to organic crop production.
- Tossing all kitchen food scraps and kitchen waste into the same bin is the easiest practice for my staff and no big deal for the amount of scraps and waste that we generate.
- Prepping food scraps to be placed into a composting bin is too messy and requires too much labor.
- The outdoor space behind my kitchen is too limited to add a second container for compost collection services.
On the outside
of the kitcheh door
- After donations are made, what happens to unconsumable food scraps is inconsequential and my role in the responsible management of the food chain ends once I put the food on the plate.
- I did not realize that food scraps are the number one cause of methane gas in landfills, which is 25 times more harmful to the ozone layer than carbon dioxide, co2, and 40% of this most unfriendly earth gas escapes before it can be captured.
- Finished composts are the predominant soil amendment used in organic farming yet, my choice to dispose of compostable food scraps makes local organic crop production more difficult.
- Composting operations are always located within proximity to where scraps and organic debris are generated. I have never considered the volume of energy consumed and emissions generated when a multinational waste company hauls my kitchen scraps to an unknown landfill destination.
- Should the fact that 99% of all composting enterprises in the United States are locally owned, small businesses that are aiding in the expansion and development of neighborhood green infrastructures and job creations be valued by me?
- I know that composting is an aerobic process and that landfills are anaerobic. What I might not realize is the EPA finding identifying that food scraps, when sent to a landfill, generate over 1200% more methane than when diverted to a composting site.
- I feel justified in my decision to have food scraps landfilled because it is usually the cheaper option.
- If my customers knew the negative impacts associated with landfilling food scraps, when numerous composting options are available, would they start to question the genuineness of claims made that this establishment supports local agriculture, first?
- The choice made here to landfill food scraps can make local, organic food production more difficult and more costly.
- To separate compostables in my kitchen would require a hand movement of about ten inches. Instead of dropping a peel into the bin designated for landfills it would now be dropped into a bin designated for composting. Is that ten inch movement too much to achieve?
- Non-consumable food scraps being diverted to commercial composting enterprises require no prep work and no size reduction.
- As my facility will still be generating the exact same amount of non-consumables and waste, logically the size of the landfill dumpster should be reduced when composting is added, thereby allowing space for a composting container.
| In my establishment, we make the effort to donate uneaten food, when possible. | After donations are made, what happens to unconsumable food scraps is inconsequential and my role in the responsible management of the food chain ends once I put the food on the plate. |
| In this commercial kitchen, I believe earth friendly practices are valued and used regarding its operation. | I did not realize that food scraps are the number one cause of methane gas in landfills, which is 25 times more harmful to the ozone layer than carbon dioxide, co2, and 40% of this most unfriendly earth gas escapes before it can be captured. |
| My preference in purchasing food is to buy organic. | Finished composts are the predominant soil amendment used in organic farming yet, my choice to dispose of compostable food scraps makes local organic crop production more difficult. |
| When possible, my first choice is to buy food from local growers. | Composting operations are always located within proximity to where scraps and organic debris are generated. I have never considered the volume of energy consumed and emissions generated when a multinational waste company hauls my kitchen scraps to an unknown landfill destination. |
| I know that supporting independent and small food producers has a multi-tiered benefit on the local economy and on community viability. | Should the fact that 99% of all composting enterprises in the United States are locally owned, small businesses that are aiding in the expansion and development of neighborhood green infrastructures and job creations be valued by me? |
| I understand the future management of climate change will be the defining issue for my generation on global sustainability. | I know that composting is an aerobic process and that landfills are anaerobic. What I might not realize is the EPA finding identifying that food scraps, when sent to a landfill, generate over 1200% more methane than when diverted to a composting site. |
| I recognize that buying locally produced organic food may cost more than mass produced non-regional items. | I feel justified in my decision to have food scraps landfilled because it is usually the cheaper option. |
| The patrons of my kitchen and I mutually value the sourcing of local organic food and are willing to support the local economy for this outcome. | If my customers knew the negative impacts associated with landfilling food scraps, when numerous composting options are available, would they start to question the genuineness of claims made that this establishment supports local agriculture, first? |
| I know that healthy, nutrient rich, and chemically free soil is the key to organic crop production. | The choice made here to landfill food scraps can make local, organic food production more difficult and more costly. |
| Tossing all kitchen food scraps and kitchen waste into the same bin is the easiest practice for my staff and no big deal for the amount of scraps and waste that we generate. | To separate compostables in my kitchen would require a hand movement of about ten inches. Instead of dropping a peel into the bin designated for landfills it would now be dropped into a bin designated for composting. Is that ten inch movement too much to achieve? |
| Prepping food scraps to be placed into a composting bin is too messy and requires too much labor. | Non-consumable food scraps being diverted to commercial composting enterprises require no prep work and no size reduction. |
| The outdoor space behind my kitchen is too limited to add a second container for compost collection services. | As my facility will still be generating the exact same amount of non-consumables and waste, logically the size of the landfill dumpster should be reduced when composting is added, thereby allowing space for a composting container. |
