Walsh proposes statewide food-waste
collection
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| NeoEnergy's food digester, soon to be at Quonset. It will be the first on the East Coast. (graphic from NeoEnergy via ecoRI.org) Get more details on this process by clicking here. |
STATE HOUSE news release – Legislation introduced by Rep. Donna M.Walsh would sow the seeds for more widespread composting and reduction of
food-scrap waste in Rhode Island.
The legislation is aimed at extending the limited life
of the state’s Central Landfill by reducing the waste dumped there, harnessing
the waste’s potential for production of energy and organic fertilizer and
giving a boost to Rhode Island’s green economy.
Representative Walsh’s legislation (2014-H
7033) would phase in a requirement that all non-residential food waste be
separated from waste headed for the landfill and recycled or otherwise
processed in a useful way, provided there is a facility available. The
requirement would be phased in beginning with large producers – those producing
an average of more than one ton of such waste a week, most likely colleges and
other large institutions – in 2015, down to smaller-scale producers, eventually
applying to all Rhode Island businesses and institutions by 2021. Massachusetts
and Connecticut have similar requirements aimed at large institutions, and a
Vermont law will require recycling of all commercial and residential food waste
by 2020.
Under Representative Walsh’s legislation, institutions
subject to the requirement would be required to educate those disposing of
waste – for example, students in a college dining hall – about how to separate
food waste from other garbage and where to properly dispose of it. The
institution could then either send the food waste to a food waste recycling
facility or recycle the material itself onsite, provided it is equipped to do
so safely and in compliance with all laws.
Johnson & Wales University is already diverting food
scraps in this way at its Harborside campus, diverting scraps from two of its
buildings – which include a student dining facility and JWU’s culinary training
programs – to food digesters that convert it to compost that is used to enrich
soil and mulch. University officials estimate they had been generating over 200
tons of food waste a year at each of the two buildings, and that it made up
about 85 percent of the waste there.
Representative Walsh said she got the idea for her
legislation during a recent tour of Quonset Business Park, when she learned
about a company called NEO Energy that is working to establish an anaerobic
digestion facility there. The plant would accept food waste from supermarkets,
food-processing companies, restaurants, institutions and municipalities,
separate the biogases for use as a fuel to generate electricity and heat, and
recycle the remaining solids as organic fertilizer.
Similar plants are widespread
in Europe and around the world, especially in Germany. There are more than
1,600 such plants in the United States, mainly located at wastewater treatment
plants, although relatively few use the biogas they produce to generate energy.
The requirements in her legislation would become
effective only when such a facility exists to serve Rhode Island, but the
legislation would not require anyone to use it. As long as they are not
throwing food waste in the regular trash, institutions would be free to process
food waste on their own either through composting or equipment like the
machines at JWU.
Representative Walsh said, although her bill does not
apply to residential trash, she hopes someday all Rhode Islanders will be
separating food waste, and that municipal waste collection would include
separate containers for food scraps, just like there are for recyclables.
Dozens of large U.S. cities, including San Francisco and Seattle, require
residents to separate food waste for composting or other processing, and New
York City recently began a voluntary program.
Rhode Island’s small size, and
its situation of having a single, statewide landfill that is on track to be
filled to capacity by about 2038, are good reasons to consider a statewide
requirement for food waste separation. Besides, municipalities save money on
landfill tipping fees when they reduce the trash they haul there. The
Environmental Protection Agency estimates that food and yard waste make up
about 28 percent of what’s thrown out nationwide.
“Many Rhode Islanders, in the cities, the suburbs
and the rural communities, are already composting at home. It’s easy once you
get in the habit, and there are so many benefits. I look forward to generating
some healthy public discussion about recycling food scraps this year as we
consider this legislation, and I hope we’ll be doing something better with much
of the food waste in our state soon,” said Representative Walsh.