Congratulations to the City of San Francisco for having just hit the 2 billion pounds (1 million tons) mark for the amount of waste they’ve composted since 1996. The city took the optional program to mandatory in 2009 and provided residents with green bins at the time.
What’s particularly remarkable is the rate of growth the program. It took 15 years to collect this amount, but they are on track to collect another million tons within the next 5 years. To me, that shows that people and businesses are learning quickly and complying with the regulations.
What’s also interesting is that the amount of organic waste they’ve kept out of landfills offsets the city’s carbon emissions by 354,000 metric tons – the equivalent of offsetting emissions from all the vehicles traveling across the city’s Bay Bridge for just over two years.
From a vendor’s perspective, San Francisco has been a very easy city to do business with on this program and has been very collaborate in building the program that works for all parties. Recology manages the composting facility.
Congrats to the City and to everyone involved. You’ve set a great example for the rest of us.
