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Riding the subway home yesterday, I picked up a section of the Washington Post and saw an article about Compost Cab, a local (to Washington, DC) company that does curbside pick-up of food scraps/compostable materials. For $32 a month they pick up your compost in front of your home from buckets they issue with liners they replace each week. I sublet a room in a row-house the first month I lived in DC with 6 other people who had a Compost Cab bucket in their kitchen. With seven people, the cost comes down to just a dollar and 1/2 a week per person - not bad! With just three people, the price seems a little luxurious.
But are there alternatives for folks in the city? I bet if we wanted we could create our own compost bin but what would we do with the compost? There are community gardens in our neighborhood but without a car, it does get a little tricky getting the compost there. (Although, my bike could haul a load!). I suppose it does come down to how intentional of a consumer I am choosing to be and the effort I want to put forth to do better for my environment. Maybe reading this article and learning a little more about composting is just the kick-in-the-pants I need....
Read more about Capitol Hill composting here and challenges in urban composting (with mention of Compost Cab).
Check out Compost Cab's blog, follow them on Twitter or like them on Facebook!
hmm, that is an interesting service! if you don't have a yard, it is hard to find a use for all the compost that you'd generate--even if you have an "apartment garden" or window plants. i've seen a lot of small stainless steel kitchen composters, but that doesn't resolve the issue of "now what?".
ReplyDeleteone alternative for some of the organic waste is keeping it in the freezer to make your own veggie stock. rob and i do that at home and it's sooo easy. you just keep raw veggie leftovers--like onion peels, carrot ends, celery leaves--in a gallon-sized ziplock bag until it's full. then you boil it all in a very very large pot until it looks like broth. then salt it. you'll have enough broth for months. i should do a blog post about it actually... :)
There's always the solution of lombri-compost. A plastic container of compost worms under the sink, and I don't know how often you would have to empty out the ready compost, but I don't think it would be more than like 2-3 times/year.
ReplyDeleteI do like that veggie broth idea too though. (Of course that doesn't do away with coffee grounds and tea bags and pumpkin guts, ...)
Can do both, make broth from veggie bits kept in the freezer until stock making time, then compost what's left of the veggie bits. Suggest letting it cool a bit before putting it in with the worms. Voila!
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