Do organic waste bans and composting programs really take a bite out of food waste?

Food waste bans have had mixed results so far. In California, legislation helped divert 2 million tons of organic waste from landfills from 2018 to 2021, and more than 380,000 tons of food waste are diverted annually as a result of organics bans in Massachusetts. But in Vermont, the percentage of food scraps as a volume of waste in the landfill decreased less than 1 percent after the food waste-disposal ban went into effect. Moreover, 12 percent of households reported putting their scraps in the garbage disposal, equal to an estimated 3,588 tons of food waste that ends up in wastewater treatment plants. Depending on how those plants deal with the solids in the sewage, that food waste could be fermented in an anaerobic digester that captures methane emissions, but it could also just end up in a landfill where those emissions enter the atmosphere. And even if the food waste is digested, the resulting compost could still be hazardous to use if the wastewater is contaminated with PFAS.

Despite a growing number of food waste bans and food waste-recycling programs, a new study published in “Nature Food” that used data from ReFED — a nonprofit that identifies food waste-recycling solutions — showed that state-level food waste policies are falling far short of the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) 2030 Food Loss and Waste Reduction Goal. In fact, the amount of food waste generated has increased. An overemphasis on food recycling and composting programs may be to blame.

Overemphasis on recycling

Managing food waste is not the same thing as reducing food waste from the outset. Strategies like meal planning, purchasing smaller quantities, using about-to-expire foods and eating leftovers — as well as commercial strategies like better managing ordering and inventory — result in fewer food scraps that are sent to the landfill or need to be composted. It’s an important distinction, one that gets lost when composting programs get most of the focus.

Composting food scraps is one of the simplest food waste-reduction strategies to enact, according to Josh Kelly, solid waste program manager for the Vermont Agency of National Resources.

“Reduction and reuse are complicated; they’re hard to measure, hard to track and hard to enforce,” Kelly says. “So, we start with food waste often from a point of regulating composting facilities or requiring that food waste goes to a place that’s an alternative to a landfill.”

These waste-diversion methods might be relatively easy for people to adopt, but even properly composted food is still technically wasted because it wasn’t eaten. In light of this, in 2021, the EPA changed how it measured food waste; it began counting food scraps going to compost and anaerobic digestion as part of the problem, not part of the solution toward its 2030 goal.

“Recycling solutions are no longer considered as waste reduction,” says Sarah Kakadellis, Ph.D., a postdoctoral researcher at UC Davis and coauthor of the study in “Nature Food.”  “But that doesn’t mean that they’re not important.”

Composting and other recycling solutions are still a valuable way to reduce emissions that come from wasted food while producing useful byproducts. Kakadellis notes that states are pushing for more facilities for anaerobic digestion. This process, which breaks down food waste in sealed tanks using specialized bacteria, requires less space than oxygen-dependent (i.e. aerobic) methods like composting, and can therefore accommodate more food waste. It also captures methane gas that can be burned for energy, repurposing greenhouse gases that would otherwise escape into the atmosphere. But, she adds, when we go that route “we are not directly contributing to the food waste-reduction goal.”

Prioritizing prevention

More than one-third of food produced is unsold or uneaten and just a small portion of that is donated. Instead, it becomes food waste and has an enormous impact on the environment. The sheer volume of wasted food led ReFED to call the food system “radically inefficient.”

When food is wasted, all of the resources used to produce, process, transport and store it are wasted, too. That accounts for at least 15 percent of annual global fossil fuel use — generating emissions equivalent to those of Russia and all countries in the European Union combined. The outsized environmental impact of food production and processing necessitates a holistic approach to food waste reduction.

Kakadellis believes there’s traction with adopting a strong narrative around composting or recycling food waste because it’s easy and convenient, but adds, “It doesn’t require us to think about our wasting behavior; it doesn’t require us to think about how to better manage our food. … It doesn’t require us to think about how to optimize that supply chain or how to prevent and identify where to reduce food waste at the source.”

States that depend on recycling to fight food waste, including those that introduced bans on disposing of food scraps in landfills, are less successful in reducing waste than states that take a more comprehensive approach (for example, one that might include education programs around prevention or legislation to adjust food labeling/best-by dates).

“[Food waste] recycling is important in the sense that anaerobic digestion of food and organic waste in landfills creates methane, and methane is really destructive,” says Asch Harwood, vice president of data and insights for ReFED. “But … preventing that excess food from being created is really important.”