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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