City gets $90,000 grant to pilot composting projects

Two-year program to focus on research

Pittsburgh will be receiving a $90,000 grant for a Community Compost and Food Waste Reduction pilot project it was announced on Thursday.

The grant money, which is from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), will fund a two-year pilot project to develop and test strategies for planning and implementing municipal compost and food waste reduction plans, city officials said in a release.

The pilot will help design composting opportunities that can be expanded to the community as part of the city’s Climate Action Plan, city officials said in a release. The Climate Action Plan outlines goals for sustainable and renewable energy resources by 2030.

A spokeswoman for the mayor’s office said that the city is always looking for new opportunities to research and reach sustainability efforts.

According to a press release, the pilot will focus on gathering research about composting in the area. It also will implement three composting solutions — public composting at city events, a mechanical composter and traditional compost methods at city facilities — and will see which ones are viable for city operations to later scale up.

The first year of the program will focus on researching already existing food waste systems and composting in the area. The second year of the program will begin to put theory into practice, and test new composting opportunities at city facilities and events.

The city will seek a local, licensed composting business through a competitive application process to manage an organic composting booth at citysponsored farmers’ markets, where visitors can bring their compost and vendors will receive support to transition products to ‘compost compatible’ to host zero-waste markets, according to the release.

The city also will pilot two internal composting operations at Phillips Recreation Center in Carrick and at the Homewood Healthy Active Living Center, in hopes that the projects will be expanded to accept community compost.

The Phillips Recreation Center’s site will employ a traditional composting method, according to the release, which requires layering two types of organic materials like leaves and food scraps that break down over time into a soil-like substance used for planting.

Mechanical composting will be piloted at the Homewood

Healthy Active Living Center. In mechanical composting, materials are put into a vessel and spun to breakdown the materials to become a soil-like substance for planting.

The Department of City Planning’s Sustainability and Resilience Division will work with Department of Parks and Recreation and the Office of Special Events, as well as outside agencies, to complete the project.

Through the Community Compost and Food Waste Reduction Project, the USDA is investing approximately $1.92 million in 24 pilot projects to develop and implement strategies for municipal compost plans and food waste reduction plans, according to the USDA.