City Council Passes Bill Requiring Mandatory Food Waste Composting by NYC Residents

On June 8th, the New York City Council passed a legislative package that includes a citywide residential curbside organics collection program” as part of the city’s Zero Waste efforts. Part of the five-bill “Zero Waste Act” legislation, the mandatory program is intended to divert organic waste from landfills, “where it produces a particularly potent greenhouse gas called methane.” Until the city is able to set up better composting infrastructure, much of the collected organics will be fed into anaerobic digesters that capture the methane to generate energy that can be used to replace fossil fuels. In addition, the package “sets zero waste targets for 2030, requires annual reporting on Zero Waste efforts, creates community food scrap drop-off sites, and establishes new community recycling centers in the five boroughs. Brooklyn and Queens will be the first to see the rollout of the residential mandate that is slated to begin this October, followed by the Bronx and Staten Island in March 2024, and Manhattan in October 2024.

Source:    https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/08/nyregion/food-composting-nyc.html