Did you know that a third of your household waste is organic waste, usually from discarded food?
Keeping organic waste separate from household waste helps to reduce landfill. Food waste can be converted into high-grade organic compost, ensuring that valuable resource isn’t lost.
Organic waste can cause serious problems when it enters landfill. Find out more about our organic waste collection in Melbourne and how you can do your part for our environment.
According to Sustainability Victoria, the average Victorian household throws away around $2,200 worth of food each year. This adds up to 250,000 tonnes of food discarded each year across the state — it’s a significant amount!
When food waste or organic waste enters the landfill, it emits greenhouse gases, including methane, as it decomposes. These harmful gases harm the environment as well as human health.
Aerobically composted organic waste is kept out of landfill and creates less harmful gases that form a natural part of the biogenic cycle. Farmers and gardeners can then use this compost to grow fresh produce.
Reducing the amount of organic waste in household rubbish also helps more general waste items such as paper and cardboard to be sorted for recycling, further reducing the total volume of landfill.
Most types of food rubbish can go into organic waste, including:
Small amounts of meat and fish from plate scrapings can go into organic waste, but large portions need to go into household rubbish.
Items that are not quickly biodegradable cannot go into organic waste. These include:
Organic waste mustn’t be contaminated at all. If you aren’t sure if an item is organic waste, put it into your household rubbish.
Contamination of organic waste is a safety risk to the people handling waste, damage machinery and reduce the quality of the final compost product. When you take the time to ensure organic waste is not contaminated, it helps our team to process and recycle more effectively!
You can find more information about what can and cannot go into organic waste
As organic waste begins to decompose, it may emit a bad smell, especially in summer. Don’t let this prevent you from recycling organic waste!
Here are some tips to prevent an unpleasant odour:
After each collection day, rinse the bin with the hose and allow it to dry before refilling it with fresh waste. Eucalyptus or vinegar around the bin opening can help to repel flies and other insects from organic waste.
Not all councils in Victoria will collect organic waste for free, and the collections can be infrequent. If your council collection isn’t frequent enough, you can have organic waste collected by WM Waste Management.
No, WM Waste Management does not collect organic waste.
A truck collects organic waste for transport to a waste processing facility. Here it is spread out for sorting to remove any contamination.
After sorting, uncontaminated organic waste is feed into a composter and heated to 60 degrees Celsius to kill any dangerous bacteria and other organisms. After three days, it’s removed and re-sorted on conveyor belts to catch any contaminants such as metal or plastic not removed during the first sorting.
Next, organic waste is spread in the warm and humid environment of large aeration sheds for 42 days. A final sort checks for contamination before processing into rich compost with additional nutritive additives.
The final product fertilises commercial gardens, farms and public gardens. Compost is a valuable organic resource that provides the nutrition that grows flowers, fruit and vegetables in Victoria.
Using compost in gardening, landscaping and horticulture has many benefits. Compost helps restore the health and fertility of the soil and reduces the amount of synthetic fertiliser used. It also helps to reduce the amount of watering needed to grow plants.
© 2024 WM Waste Management Services | All Rights Reserved