SAN ANTONIO – The green bins that the city of San Antonio provides pick up for aren’t just for yard clippings, but more importantly for food waste.
So why is it so crucial to not toss food and paper waste into the trash?
According to the EPA, in 2017, 75% of food waste generated in the U.S. was as landfilled, 19% was incinerated at waste to energy and only 6% was composted.
Why is this terrifying? Food waste has a high moisture content (60-80%) which adds significant weight and contributes to landfill gas generation, releasing more methane which traps heat in our atmosphere and is a huge contributor to global warming.
How can we fix this?
Toss your food waste, dirty paper products and coffee grinds into your green bins.
San Antonio is one of the few cities in the country to have a green bin organics program. In 2020, the program composted about 70,000 tons of organic material and composts 50-60 tons a day.
When we toss our food waste into our green bins, the city doesn’t take these bins to the landfill, but to its organics material program, Atlas Organics. Here all the green bin waste naturally decomposes because microorganisms love to eat dead organic matter.
Myra Arthur visited Atlas Organics in 2022, to see how the plant works with the city and explains how that partnership works.
An easy way to encourage this is to get a kitchen-top compost bin that you can dump into your green bins.
No they don’t smell up your kitchen, they are designed to keep the smell of rotting food inside.
If you Google them, you can find several affordable ones online, or you can get one for free by visiting your San Antonio city council district office. Call your district office first, to make sure they have them on site.
Line your kitchen-top bin with a grocery store paper bag and once it gets full, take it outside to dump into your green bin.