In other news, I’ve started composting food scraps in earnest. Wednesday, I set up my compost bin, which looks like this:
While I’d been composting sporadically with a half-hearted pile, I’m fully invested now that I have an actual bin. I keep a Ben & Jerry’s pint by the sink to store all of my scraps. This container seems appropriately green–both because I’m reusing it and because those Vermont boys are pretty eco-friendly.
I’ve been filling the Vanilla pint every day mostly with peels, ends and coffee grinds that can’t be used. I don’t count that stuff as wasted food, but it is food waste that shouldn’t go to landfills. Hopefully, that distinction is clear.
While I’ve been surprised by how quickly the B & J pint fills, it makes sense because each person makes about a 0.5 pounds of food waste and 4.5 pounds of trash each day. For those interested, the first figure comes from this PowerPoint document–nc-food-waste-generation.ppt–that features some cute looking trash. The second figure comes from page 12 of the EPA’s Municipal Solid Waste in the United States.