Americans waste more than a third of the food available to them, and every expired salad or soft banana that ends up in the trash contributes to rising emissions of methane, one of the most potent climate-warming gases.
Municipalities across Minnesota are required by law to increase organic waste recycling and are expanding composting programs to keep food out of landfills.
Controlled composting of materials reduces greenhouse gas emissions that occur when organic matter decays rapidly in landfills.
The Pope Douglas Organics Recycling Facility, located about 30 minutes west of Alexandria, processes food waste from five counties into compost.
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Standing inside a large, open-ended, ring-shaped building, Environmental Programs Manager Nathan Reinbold explains that the computerized compost facility is “pretty much state-of-the-art as far as composting goes in the state of Minnesota.”
Pope Douglas Environmental Program Manager Nathan Reinbold sits in front of the organics recycling facility, which was designed to be expandable to accommodate increased demand for food recycling.
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A garbage truck carrying organic waste from Morris, 25 miles away, dumps compostable paper products and bags of food next to piles of rotting meat and vegetables, used paper towels and greasy pizza boxes.
Food waste is mixed with wood chips, grass clippings and leaves in a concrete bin, where a computer monitors the airflow through the pile, speeding up the process and raising the temperature high enough to kill pathogens.
Controlling spoilage also reduces the smell of spoiled food.
“It's kind of sweet and smells like pipe tobacco or something,” Reinbold said.
Items that cannot be composted may be mixed with organic waste for recycling. At the Glacial Ridge Composting Facility in Douglas County, glass bottles are items that must be removed before they can be composted.
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In Minnesota, food waste makes up about 20 percent of landfill waste, and half of municipal trash is compostable. Putting that waste in landfills is problematic.
“The No. 1 cause is methane production,” Reinbold says. “Landfilling organic food waste is a bad idea. It's one of the biggest contributors to methane.”
According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the nation's municipal solid waste landfills are the third-largest source of methane emissions from human activities.
Composting is one solution.
Curbside food waste recycling is feasible in densely populated urban areas, but not in rural areas.
A kitchen worker shovels plates into a food recycling bin at Pike & Pint restaurant in Alexandria on April 25.
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The county collects food waste from bins at larger institutions such as schools, hospitals and restaurants.
Separating food waste for recycling “isn't a huge task,” said Jen Paustian, executive chef at Pike & Pint Grill in Alexandria, which keeps food-waste bins next to where dirty dishes are washed and where food is prepared each day.
Paustian sees no downsides to recycling food, other than the bins behind the restaurant “getting a little smelly” in the summer.
Rebecca LaSchuer, owner of Fabled Farm restaurant in Fergus Falls, has always tried to recycle her food waste, but it was difficult until Otter Tail County recently started an organics recycling program.
“They provide us with two compost bins and they come to collect them once a week,” she says. “It's really convenient.”
For now, the program is free, so the only costs are the compostable bags she uses and a little bit of her time spent training her staff on what to put in the compost bins.
Waste collected in Otter Tail County is transported to the Pope Douglas compost site.
Rebecca LaSchuer (left), owner of Fabled Farmer restaurant in Fergus Falls, likes the ease of Otter Tail County's organics recycling program.
Dan Gunderson | MPR News
However, instead of collecting food waste from households, Otter Tail County also encourages backyard composting.
“It's really not cost-effective or environmentally sound to have big trucks driving around the county picking up trash,” said Chris McConn, solid waste director.
So the county is providing residents with backyard compost bins and stainless steel buckets for collecting food waste in their kitchens.
“A big part of our program is the county does nothing but provide good education and supplies to residents,” Macon said, adding that it can be hard to convince people with busy lives to take the extra time to not throw food in the trash.
Otter Tail County resident Zach Stack composts his food scraps in a compost bin provided by the county.
Courtesy of Zach Stack
Fergus Falls resident Zach Stack is passionate about composting food leftovers for his family of eight.
“I have what my kids call a 'yak bucket' on the counter, where I put all my organic food leftovers,” he explained. “If I leave them out too long, they start to get a little stinky.”
So, Stack says, he typically dumps the contents of the bucket into a backyard compost maker twice a week, then uses the resulting compost in his vegetable patch.
Backyard food composting has different rules because temperatures don't get as high as those in controlled commercial composting facilities. Stack avoids putting meat scraps and dairy products in the bin.
Local residents can drop off their food waste at this drop site in Alexandria.
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Composting food waste is an important way to reduce methane emissions from landfills, but state officials say it's not the best solution.
“Could we have prevented food waste simply by changing policies, management, the way we prepare food, the way we transport food?” asked Mark Rust, supervisor of the MPCA's Sustainable Materials Management Unit.
“Preventing food waste has a much greater greenhouse gas and energy impact than rescuing it, composting it or using it for other purposes,” Last says.
Food Rescue takes surplus food that would otherwise be thrown away and finds new uses for it through food shelves and other distribution systems.
To help fund these efforts, the Northfield nonprofit is developing a first-of-its-kind carbon credit program for rescued food. The Community Action Center collects and distributes between 250,000 and 350,000 pounds of food each year.
“We think that could easily be a steady source of income of $25,000 to $45,000 just from our food shelves,” said Executive Director Scott Waupata, who expects carbon credits for the rescued food to be finalized later this year.
“I think the real excitement starts when you start thinking about how many food shelves we have across the state of Minnesota,” Waupata said. “How do we tie them all together? And what would those revenue streams be if we could take all that data that we've compiled and do some collective bargaining on a larger scale?”
Most of the food rescued comes from grocery stores and large facilities, but about half of all food waste comes from home kitchens.
“Homes have a tremendous opportunity to participate in climate change mitigation efforts,” said Tabitha Birdwell, sustainable materials management specialist at the MPCA.
While reducing carbon dioxide emissions would have a long-term effect on mitigating climate change, scientists say reducing methane emissions would slow climate warming more rapidly.
“So in the short term, if we can take steps to significantly reduce the amount of methane emitted through food waste processing, we can have a significant impact on climate change,” Birdwell said.
Pope Douglas Environmental Program Manager Nathan Reinbold holds finished compost at Douglas County's Glacial Ridge Organics Composting Facility.
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The MPCA wants to cut food waste in half by 2030. Counties have mandated goals to increase recycling of organic materials.
Last wants consumers to understand that they can play a part in reducing food waste.
“Think about what you're buying and what you're throwing away. Do you feel like you're too busy and your buying habits aren't in sync with your spending habits? There may be some simple things you can do that will add up, especially if more people are starting to think about it.”
