We’re going to go ahead and assume that the vast majority of you reading this have never worked in a landfill or urban waste disposal facility. If you did you’d be very much aware of just how much food waste is produced, and more disturbingly just how much of it is disposed improperly. The fact that it can decompose means it is hugely of problematic for those in charge of handling the waste and processing it properly. We don’t need to explain how it would be that way, and fortunately with our expertise being with dumpster rentals in Trenton and Colborne we don’t deal with this stuff.
But better and more responsible of food waste is directly in line with more efficient and less harmful disposal of waste. Along with better recycling of it too, as food waste can contaminate material that otherwise might be recyclable. This is especially true for plastics, and the need to recycle and repurpose plastic more effectively is a pressing issue all around the world. For every one of our Colborne area disposal bin rentals there’s a thousand + pieces of plastic that go into the trash every minute in North America, and it’s not going to work out well if society continues to operate this way.
Call us for your waste disposal service needs in Trenton and Belleville, but when it comes to being better about this stuff it’s not realistic to download it all onto the individual. Government policy needs to be a part of it, especially if the changes promoted are to become permanent. So it’s trends that are helping to keep food out of landfills that will be the focus for our blog entry today.
Neighbors to the South
We’re quite okay with admitting that our US neighbors are doing considerably better than we are in Canada with better food waste disposal. Again, it’s not part of what we do with providing dumpster rentals for Tweed and Castleton here at Load n’ Lift, but the one state that is really becoming noteworthy for what they’ve done to reduce food waste in landfills there. Which is all important as scientists and government officials increasingly recognize food waste as being a major accelerator for climate change.
It’s an uncomfortable reality that half of the greenhouse gas emissions from the entire food system are attributable to the production and disposing of uneaten food. Massachusetts chose to pass regulations curbing food waste, and there is research that proves what they are doing is working and being a beneficial influence. Indeed, the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP) is starting to be recognized as a national leader and it might be that we can hope for Provincial governments in Canada to take note of what they are doing so well.
There are estimates that around 35% of food produced in the United States is never eaten, and even though our population is about 10x smaller than theirs it doesn’t make sense to think we are any better about keeping food out of the trash. Much of it ends up in landfills, and when it does it will eventually start to give off methane. Which is one of the worst greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change. There are similar estimates that methane emissions from the landfills of any one state in the USA have the same climate impacts as more than 100,000 ICE (internal combustion engine) cars on the road for a year.
Ton Plus
Most of you will probably now be asking to know what specifically they did to stem the flow of food into landfills. We’ll get right to laying that out and conclude this blog entry with it. The legislators in Massachusetts have enacted food waste bans with laws that forbid sending organic waste to landfills or incinerators. Five other states also put a food waste ban in place with legislation – California, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Vermont. Massachusetts’ first one came over a decade ago, and with it businesses were required keep food waste out of landfills if they were producing more than a ton of it a week.
We’d never see that much of any type of waste with our Trenton rubbish removal service although we have had other types of organic waste in our dumpster rentals. But it is not the type that will spoil like food would. What happened back then in Massachusetts was businesses were told to divert edible surplus food to charities or food recovery services, and then to send food waste to compost facilities or anaerobic digesters that could convert into usable energy. Massachusetts enacted a stricter ban in 2022, lowering the threshold to a half-ton of food waste per week.
We think this is something that our Provincial government in Ontario should look at and see if similar legislation might be a good idea here. Because if you’ve been to a landfill recently you’ll know that it’s very much a need. And we imagine that’s equally true in any major metropolitan region anywhere in Canada. Wasting food is problematic enough, and have it be disposed improperly is something that can’t go alongside that fact.
Call Load n’ Lift first and get the best rates and service for dumpster rentals and waste disposal in the Trenton and Colborne area of Ontario, and for neighboring communities of Belleville, Camborne, Morganston, and Havelock among others. We can offer same day dumpster bin deliveries and contractors also have the option of a lease to own disposal bin, something that will be appealing to some home builders or renovators too. We have disposal bins for rent in 7, 8, 11, 16, 20, and 25 yard sizes and we are fully insured for all jobs.
