News

April 21, 2009

Waste Not

The Earth Tub composter in the parking lot of Freeport, Maine-based Harraseeket Inn produces 150 to 200 yards of compost each year. Some of that compost is used by the same local farmers who supply the inn with organic produce and some is taken home by guests for their own gardens.

The earth tub helps build goodwill in the community, but it also helps cut the inn’s trash-removal bill. The operation’s composting and recycling programs have reduced its trash-removal costs from $1,500 per month to $300 per month for eight to nine months a year, reports the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram.

The Harraseeket Inn was among the restaurants certified as “environmental leaders” by the Maine Department of Environmental Protection.

Operators in San Francisco also are putting their waste to good use. Some 2,000 restaurants together with 2,080 apartment buildings and 50,000 single-family homes are utilizing the city’s eco-friendly green bins. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, in a year, 105,000 tons of food scraps and yard trimmings become 20,000 tons of compost for 10,000 acres.

The rich compost is so highly prized by Bay Area wine growers and vegetable and nut farmers that it sells out during peak spreading season. Farmer Bob Cannard has purchased San Francisco compost for three years. He supplies vegetables to several local restaurants and operates an institute that teaches young farmers how to grow food for local restaurants and residents.

“Send us your scrap,” he says, “and we’ll send it back to you as food. We can’t do it ourselves.”

San Francisco’s waste-handling efforts have been so successful that other cities are following their example. But the city isn’t resting on its laurels; San Francisco is working toward a goal of diverting three-quarters of its waste from landfills by 2010.

Another city working to reduce waste is Atlanta. The Atlanta Business Chronicle reports that the Georgia World Congress Center (GWCC) and several downtown convention hotels and restaurants are teaming up with the federal government and environmental groups to create a Zero Waste Zone. Ruth’s Chris Steak House and the Hyatt Regency Atlanta are among those operations pledging to ramp up their recycling programs.

“The companies participating in Atlanta’s downtown Zero Waste Zone, the first in the Southeast and one of just a handful across the nation, will recover materials that would ordinarily be sent to a landfill and instead put them to good use,” says EPA Region 4 Acting Regional Administrator Stan Meiburg.

GWCC is the country’s fourth-largest convention center and its food contractor, Levy Restaurants, is partnering with EnviRelations, LLC, in Washington, DC, to compost food waste. This effort is expected to save some 34 tons of organic materials from entering area landfills each month.

“Eliminating waste is important and EPA applauds the Green Foodservice Alliance, the Georgia Restaurant Association and Atlanta Recycles for working with downtown businesses to rethink their foodservice operations with reuse and recycling in mind.”