Tacoma Begins Food Waste Recycling Service (with video)

Tacoma, Wash., has launched a food waste recycling program.

The city said in a news release it has begun the service to Tacoma’s 54,000 single-family homes by providing little brown kitchen buckets for collecting food scraps. Residents can collect the scraps in the bucket and then empty them in a larger brown yard waste container to set out at the curb for pickup. There is no additional charge to residents.

Food waste makes up one-third (approximately 14,000 tons) of the annual waste generated by the city’s single-family households, according to a Tacoma Solid Waste Management department audit.

 “Our new food waste recycling service offers customers the ability to reduce their garbage and allows us to recycle material that would otherwise go into the landfill,” said Jetta Antonakos, food waste recycling program manager for the department.

Food waste accepted includes fruit and vegetables; leftovers/kitchen scraps; breads, grains, pasta, cereal; meat, poultry, seafood (including bones); and dairy and eggs (including shells).