Backyard Composting

Month: September 2020

What is the Idea of ​​Composting

Compost Katie’s objective is to reduce the amount of food wastes that our landfills and water treatment centers must work with. By using vermicompost to recycle food waste, we reduce the methane that our landfills produce. By removing food wastes from our garbage disposals, we greatly reduce sewage blockages and sanitary sewer overflows. By returning food waste back into the food chain we are able to enrich farm lands and community gardens.

5 gallon weekly compost service sign up

45 gallon weekly compost service sign up

About Landfills

Landfills and dumps poison our air, water, land and food supplies, and their use fuels an unsustainable linear system of consumption. As the largest human-created source of methane gas, landfills are a significant contributor to climate change.

Did you know there is more food waste in landfills than diapers, Styrofoam and tires combined?

The organic nutrients present in food and paper waste are removed from the food chain via landfills, requiring gardeners and farmers to rely on chemical fertilizers to replenish their soils. This leads to agricultural runoff which is most notable for its algae blooms in still bodies of water as well as the contamination of our ground water.

There is little disagreement that composting food wastes is the gold standard when it comes to environmental sustainability.

40 percent of trash in landfills is food waste. This makes food waste the single biggest offender in landfill methane gas.

Methane gas is 23 times more efficient at trapping heat than carbon dioxide.

By composting food wastes, we are reducing the amount of methane produce by landfills, extending the life of our landfill space and reducing the risk of ground water contamination.

The U.S. EPA has identified landfills as the single largest source of methane.

Answers to Frequently Asked Questions About Compost

WHAT IS COMPOST KATIE?
Compost Katie is a weekly curbside removal of all vegetable scraps, breads, napkins, cooked meats, cheeses, fruit pits and all fruit, pizza boxes, news papers, coffee grounds, used coffee filters and lawn debris (e.g. leaves and bundled twigs.)

WHAT ISN’T COMPOST KATIE?
Raw meats and oils, plastics, styrofoam and GRASS CLIPPINGS.

WHAT HAPPENS TO COMPOST KATIE?
Compost Katie scraps are fed to our red wigglers and turned into VERMICOMPOST.

WHAT HAPPENS WITH THAT VERMICOMPOST?
Much of that vermicompost is donated to The Garden Project of Lansing which oversees 90 plus community gardens which feed over 7,000 people.

DO YOU ACCEPT LAWN WASTE?
Yes. As long as you are a Compost Katie subscriber, we will pick up all lawn clippings free of charge. That includes twigs, leaf and general lawn debris. We ask that you bundle twigs with twine. You may use any paper bag.

HOW DO I SUBSCRIBE FOR THIS SERVICE?
You can go online and sign up today at compostkatie.com or you can call (517) 367-8279 and request service. You can also give us a call with any questions that you may have.

HOW MUCH IS COMPOST KATIE?
$12 a month for the 5-gallon receptacle or $25 a month for the 45-gallon receptacle.

HOW DO I PAY COMPOST KATIE?
Katie accepts all major credit cards.

WHAT IF I HAVE TO MANY FOOD SCRAPS TO FIT INTO KATIE?
We will accept an additional paper grocery bag full of food scraps. Pizza boxes can be placed under the bucket on day of pick up.

Benefits of Composting

The use of garbage disposals on our waste water treatment plants and the environment

WHAT IT ALL BOILS DOWN TO IS THAT VERMICOMPOSTING IS THE GOLD STANDARD FOR ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY

When organic materials decompose naturally, the CO2 they give off, while still a green house gas, is part of a natural (biogenic) short term carbon cycle and has little to no impact on global warming.

Garbage disposals have been called the worst technology to hit the waste water industry. Garbage disposals cause over 75 percent all sanitary sewer overflows. Sewer overflows are untreated sewage which is diverted from waste water treatment plants and usually end up into a body of water. This waste water divergence can lead to algae blooms, however most algae blooms are blamed on agricultural runoff. Had these farms acquired organic fertilizers such as compost or better yet, vermicompost, these blooms like the one in Toledo could be averted.

Many governments in Europe and the United States have banned garbage disposals all together arguing that they over tax the water treatment system.

70 percent of all food wastes thrown into the garbage disposal are water soluble and are treated via micro organisms. However, 30 percent of these food wastes go untreated and end up in a landfill.

Garbage disposals cannot handle all food scraps. Onion skins, potato peeling, spines from collards and other large leafy vegetables, celery, corn husk, artichokes, bones and fruit pits, just to name a few.

However, it should be noted that that disposing of ones food wastes through the disposal is much better than a landfill. However, Insinkerator, the largest producer of garbage disposals, will even tell you that composting is far superior to garbage disposals.

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