Getting The Job Done Food Waste Recycling Opportunities

Transcription

1 Getting The Job Done Food Waste Recycling Opportunities Nora Goldstein, Biocycle Magazine and Craig Coker, Coker Composting & Consulting

2 How Big is the Problem? million tons of MSW disposed in the U.S. Food waste is ~ 13% of MSW (33 million tons) Commercial Sources Convenience Stores (145,000+ sources in 2004) Fast Food Restaurants (214,700+ sources in 2002) Full Service Restaurants (191,250+ sources in 2002) Grocery Stores (96,550+ sources in 2002) Residential Sources Households (111,162,259 in 2007)

3 MSW Landscape: USEPA 2006 Facts and Figures Yard Trim = 12.9% Food Scraps = 12.4% Wood = 5.5% Paper = 34%

4 C&D = 6.0% Paper = 38.7% Organics = 27.1% 2005 State of Georgia Data

5 Food Waste = 13.4% Other Paper = 10.7%

6 Corrugated = 14% Food waste = 12.4% Yard waste = 3.0%

7 Recycling vs. Landfilling Few reliable estimates on percent food wastes recycled Probably less than 3% (national average) Landfilling food wastes a major source of greenhouse gases (GHG) 1 ton FW = 12 tons CO 2 equiv. (Brown, 2007) Usually not collected by gas extraction systems (food rots before systems installed)

8 Food Waste and Methane Eleazer et al 1997 Zhang et al 2007 Mg CO 2 per Mg Waste Time (days) Source: Dr. Sally Brown, University of Washington

9 Methods of Minimizing Food Wastes Source Reduction Trayless dining, bulk volume purchases Reuse Food banks, food rescue programs, other food recovery efforts Recycling Conversion to animal feeds Composting Digestion (aerobic and anaerobic)

10 BioCycle 2008 Survey Surveyed composting facilities that accepted food wastes Included: municipal, commercial, on-farm and collegiate Excluded: prisons, single user facilities (either industrial or on-farm) Total 267 facilities in 40 states 93 collegiate - 92 commercial 43 on-farm - 39 municipal

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13 2007 BioCycle MSW Composting Data: Source Separated MSW Source separated organics (SSO) that include household organics beyond yard trimmings 42 municipalities with SSO programs 17 in California 17 in King County, including Seattle 7 in Minnesota 1 in Michigan 10 composting facilities servicing these programs 4 municipally owned 6 privately owned (yard trimmings primary feedstock)

14 Food Waste Generators (by percent, after recycling) Full Service 66% are food scraps 5% compostable paper Fast Food 52% food scraps 12% compostable paper Grocery Stores 65% food scraps 6% compostable paper Large Hotels 44% food scraps 7% compostable paper Source: Cascadia Consulting Group

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17 Capturing Food Residuals At Portland (OR) Airport Coffee Shop

18 Designing For Diversion

19 Compostable Products Insist on BPI certification Compliance with ASTM D6400 Standard

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22 Success Stories

23 City and County of San Francisco, California Three-Stream Source Separation Residential, commercial and institutional organics diversion 150,000 households and small multifamily units 300-plus tons/day of source separated organics

24 Norcal Waste Systems Jepsen Prairie Organics Composting Facility Composting System Pre-grinding Initial composting in Ag-Bag pods Windrows

25 King County, Washington

26 Cedar Grove Composting Seattle, WA region Gore Cover systems Aerated static piles

27 Western Lakes Superior Sanitary District, Minnesota

28 One Million-Plus Households Serviced

29 Dufferin Transfer Station Toronto, Ontario Digestion system

30 McEnroe Farms Millerton, NY

31 Ag Choice, Andover, NJ

32 Rocky Hill Farms Saugus, MA

33 Brooks Contractor RDU Region, NC

34 Santa Cruz County, CA Olympia, WA

35 Schematic of EBMUD Food Waste Recycling Process Patent Pending

36 Pulp extruded from slurry

37 Fepro Farms Cobden, Ontario

38 Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky, Inc.

39 Capital Cost: $90,000 Avoided Tip Fees at Incinerator = $250,000

40 Impediments and Obstacles

41 Governmental Impediments to Composting and Digestion Local Lack of zoning definitions Lack of acceptable land use categories NIMBYism Historical bad apple problems State Inconsistent regulations Treating source separated FW as MSW from permitting viewpoint Minimal availability of infrastructure stimulus grants Inconsistent advocacy Federal Historical lack of leadership

42 Economic Impediments to Composting and Digestion Disposal alternatives don t represent true cost Access to affordable capital Lack of ownership of GHG problem FW alone not enough revenue source Route densities for cost-effective hauling Phobias of long-term contracts (needed to meet debt service needs of financiers)

43 Technical Obstacles Little operating experience with digestion Food waste needs pre-processing to be suitable for digestion Contamination with non-compostables

44 Issues with Food Waste Contamination Contamination Contamination!

45 Post-Consumer Contamination

46 Where do we go from here? Step 1 Identify impediments to increasing diversion Step 2 Prioritize their importance Step 3 Formulate corrective mechanisms Step 4 Test efficacy of proposed solutions Step 5 Get buy-in from stakeholders Step 6 Implement improvements Step 7 Verify improvements are working Step 8 Project transparency