Arlington food scraps containers

[Anonymous]

I used it until I ran out of the original bags. I emptied it daily, just like my other trash. I don’t have room in my budget to buy more bags so that’s the end I guess.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Come on, my elderly parents in California have been doing this for years, it's not that hard. You can put newspaper or paper bags if there's leaking, but I use these bags and carry out every couple of days and don't have that issue.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B094MYC6MX/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

If you can't do it for yourself, then do it for your kids.

I’m not anti-composting — I’ve had my own compost pile for most of my adult life. But this is a classic example of something that feels “green” but does t actually do anything for the environment. There’s no way that the energy and materials involved with manufacturing special little compostable bags, distributing them, manufacturing special containers, having trucks drive around and pick up waste & deliver it to a central facility, etc, is more environmentally friendly than simply putting that relatively small amount of waste in the garbage that will be picked up anyway and sending the landfill, and letting it decompose there. If you really care about this, make your own compost pile and use it in your garden.

These are not dedicated trucks just for food waste. We put it into the yard waste bins, which the county has been picking up for years now. Pretty much zero extra resources after the initial distribution of buckets.

If they are picking up a significant amount of food waste that used to go down the garbage disposer, &/or that used to be incinerated in Alexandria and moving it to Manassas (vs. the closer incinerator), yes, it does take more resources to move. Even if they were driving around mostly empty yard waste trucks before, and don’t need any additional trucks or runs (which I seriously doubt), the additional weight alone would require more energy to move. It’s basic physics. Did you see the video of the composting facility? The massive concrete barriers and all the bulldozers, etc? They also have no mechanism for capturing the methane produced by the decomposition of the waste. Then people drive to the facility to pick up compost and/or the facility packages it up to be shipped somewhere for sale?

I’m all for composting at home — I love it for my garden — but just don’t pretend that you’re “saving the planet.”

This is just like Farmer’s Markets. You may want to buy vegetable from the Farmer’s Markets because you think they taste better, or you like the idea of small farms as a sort of romantic thing, go ahead, but it’s not “greener.” It’s incredibly inefficient from an energy consumption standpoint.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I used it until I ran out of the original bags. I emptied it daily, just like my other trash. I don’t have room in my budget to buy more bags so that’s the end I guess.

You don’t actually have to use bags. Just put food directly in the container, empty daily as you have been doing into the green can, give it a quick rinse and let it dry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Come on, my elderly parents in California have been doing this for years, it's not that hard. You can put newspaper or paper bags if there's leaking, but I use these bags and carry out every couple of days and don't have that issue.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B094MYC6MX/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

If you can't do it for yourself, then do it for your kids.

We are trying to do this. But who has newspaper? And we don’t use paper bags, so… I worry the disposable bags actually offset any env benefit. Like the canvas tote that is worse than 1000 paper bags…

[Anonymous]

Why are you using bags for compost? We've been composting for years in DC, and we just dump everything to our compost container, and then clean the container out after we've taken it to the compost collection site.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You can put paper grocery bags in green bin so we have been dumping small container into those first.

Op here, I thought about trying this. But one time I had paper bags and some oily pizza boxes in the green bin and the crew didn’t take it. So I wasn’t sure if that was allowed.

I use paper bags all the time. I put the scraps straight into the little bin then pour them into a grocery bag before putting them in the outdoor bin. With all the leaves at the moment I try to put some of them in the bottom of the large outdoor bin first to absorb any yuck.. If the guys aren't taking your bin, complain to the county.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why are you using bags for compost? We've been composting for years in DC, and we just dump everything to our compost container, and then clean the container out after we've taken it to the compost collection site.

It's a bit trickier to clean the giant outdoor garden waste bin.

[Anonymous]

The kitchen bin instructions say to put it in the dishwasher every so often.

Don't.

I tried this, then the lid wouldn't close properly.

[Anonymous]

I did buy new compostable bags that are a little thicker. I tie it when it’s full and take it out to the curb on trash day to dump in my green bin. If I don’t have stuff in my green bin, I have an agreement with 2 of my neighbors that I can put it in their bins if they have theirs out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why are you using bags for compost? We've been composting for years in DC, and we just dump everything to our compost container, and then clean the container out after we've taken it to the compost collection site.

It's a bit trickier to clean the giant outdoor garden waste bin.

I just hose mine out. It’s not that tricky?

[Anonymous]

Annoyed that the county wasted so icy money, yes, but I threw mine right in the recycle bin and don’t feel bad at all. I’m not keeping rotting trash on my counter.