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America’s trash stream is stuffed with squandered food – 36m tons of it. According to the federal government, tossed food reaches more landfills and incinerators in America than any other municipal solid waste, and it’s a problem that Massachusetts officials are taking seriously.
Starting 1 October, approximately 1,700 of the state’s biggest food-waste generators – think hospitals, colleges, supermarkets, hotels, nursing homes, prisons and other facilities that produce at least one ton of food waste per week – must divert it away from landfills.
The state’s new commercial food-waste ban will require table scraps, withered fruits, tired vegetables, and expired packaged foods to flow toward food pantries, compost facilities, local farms – or to newly established anaerobic digestion facilities that can transform it into clean energy.
It’s the most aggressive mandatory food recycling program on the books. While Vermont and Connecticut also have both enacted commercial food-waste bans, they have a higher threshold of two tons of food waste per week.
Organic waste, meaning anything that comes from a plant or animal source and is biodegradable, makes up 25% of the Massachusetts’ current waste stream. Some of that is shipped out of state, but much of it ends up in landfills at a hefty $60-80 per ton, where it decomposes, creating harmful and unwanted methane gas.
“It’s expensive to get rid of; there’s a whole suite of environmental problems associated with it, and we’re leaving economic opportunity on the table,” says David Cash, commissioner of the Department of Environmental Protection, which will regulate the new law. “That banana peel can be turned into compost. It can be turned into energy. Not-quite-expired food can be directed to food pantries or used to feed agricultural animals.”
Cash calls the new ban “a win six ways”: it reduces the need for landfills, saves money on disposal costs, reduces greenhouse gases, provides a source for clean renewable energy, creates clean energy jobs, and produces useful products like fertilizer and compost.
Indeed, there seems to be little resistance to the ban. Individual households and small businesses are excluded. Very few restaurants reach the one-ton-per-week threshold, and many food-centric businesses like supermarkets have had food-waste reduction policies on their radar for years.
Companies adapt
Implementing change in a large facility is no piece of leftover cake, and there are a myriad ways to slice it.
Boston Medical Center is starting with food service first. Using a program called TrimTrax, the 496-bed medical center weighs food waste in their kitchens prior to disposal, creating awareness around what is being wasted.
“The team is also being diligent on food in the door and assuring that we are bringing in just what we need,” says David Maffeo, senior director of support services. “We are also in the process of transitioning to a biodigester, which will allow us to eliminate any excess food waste without sending it to a landfill.”
If you have to carry your own food, you’re less likely to overload. University of Massachusetts dining service has gone trayless across the campus. They’ve introduced “Just-in-Time” cooking, which means meals are prepared every 30 minutes, making it easier to adjust for demand. Compost bins are being installed in all retail dining rooms, and the university hosts an annual vermicompost workshop to encourage students to compost at home. An anaerobic digester is also under construction at UMass-Amherst’s wastewater treatment plant.
The efforts have paid off. According to the UMass website, “organic waste is now the largest stream of recycling on campus with over 1,000 tons diverted per year.”
Supermarket chain Hannaford’s has 26 stores in Massachusetts that will be impacted, but spokesman Michael Norton says the company’s existing sustainability strategy and a 2011 zero-waste pilot program in 11 Maine stores means the focus on diverting food waste isn’t new. Across 185 stores throughout New England and New York, the company has donated 7.2m pounds of reclaimed packaged food, has partnered with composting facilities, provided still-nutritious fruits, vegetables and bakery products to farmers with livestock, and in 2013, composted 6,955 tons of organic waste. In Massachusetts, the supermarket donated more than 200,000 pounds of fresh food, like meat, produce and deli products.
“We’re not taking a position on the specific rules and regulations in Massachusetts, but if you already have good muscle around how to reduce your waste stream, you’re going to have an easier time adapting to whatever the regulatory environment is around you,” says Norton.
The state’s role
Diverting more than 800,000 tons of current food waste will require an infrastructure that can handle it. State officials are encouraging organizations to get creative. That may mean partnering with local food banks to salvage still-edible foods, changing the way cafeterias order, prepare and serve food, and connecting businesses with local farms that may be able to use some of the waste as feed for livestock. The state is also providing technical assistance and $1m in grants, and $3m in low-interest loans to spur development of local composting and anaerobic digestion facilities.
“We’re hoping this will spawn all kinds of economic innovation that we can’t even identify yet,” Cash tells the Guardian.
The focus on food-waste reduction may help with the highly anticipated November opening of Daily Table. Led by former Trader Joe’s CEO Doug Rauch, the focus of this unique store is to rescue wholesome, nutritious food from the waste stream. That means that the store will serve less-than-perfect produce and food items that may be past their “best buy” dates, gleaned from area supermarkets, hospitals, hotels, and wholesalers, and sold at deeply discounted prices in Boston’s Dorchester neighborhood. The concept of Daily Table is a hunger and food-waste solution mashup. What worries Rauch is the potential that the state’s new ban on commercial food waste may send safe, nutritious food to the compost bin instead of where it’s needed most – in neighborhoods populated with families that are food insecure.
“I’m all for composting,” says Rauch, “But the absolutely best thing is to reduce the amount of food waste generated. Then distribute it to people who need it. Third is to distribute it to animals that we’re going to eat because it’s a better use of what’s already committed in the carbon footprint. Next is composting and anaerobic digestion, and last is landfill which is the worst thing you can do.”
And not everyone thinks the commercial food-waste ban goes far enough. Jonathon Bloom, author of Wasted Food describes the new law as a nice entrée into the realm of policy driven food-waste reduction, but says it takes individuals off the hook.
“If you’re going to increase the composting infrastructure, why not include individuals in that equation? Cities like Seattle and San Francisco have already done that. I don’t want to sound like a Debbie-Downer. It’s a step in the right direction, but I think there’s an opportunity to do more in a state as progressive as Massachusetts,” Bloom says.
Cash says no residential food-waste ban is in the works, but there’s little doubt the current commercial food-waste ban is putting the infrastructure in place should the state move in that direction later.
“Businesses need to know there will be a continual source of food waste coming before they’re going to make an investment in building things like anaerobic digesters,” says Dana Gunders, staff scientist with Natural Resource Defense Fund, and author of the group’s 2012 report on food waste. “This is enabling infrastructure to be built so a residential program down the road will have places to bring food.”
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