The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Shoreline pilot program: Don’t toss food scraps in garbage
SHORELINE — A select group of Guilford and Madison households will participate in a pilot program to divert their food scraps to energy.
Some 350 homes, in each town, in are expected to participate, at no cost, for one year. Applications for the program closed on March 1.
“I think it does create a great opportunity for people to just thinking about trash and separating things out and they don’t have to worry about managing a compost at home,” said Peggy Lyons, Madison first selectman.
Each town received $55,050 to implement the pilot, expected to start in April.
Some $5 million Sustainable Materials Management (SMM) grants from the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) was awarded to 15 municipalities and three regional groups for the development of food scrap collection programs.
Local private trash haulers will participate in the program.
Households will separate their trash and food scraps into specially designated colored bags and the food scraps will be shipped to Quantum BioPower in Southington for green energy. Food scraps include: fruits, vegetables, meat, seafood, eggs and eggshells, leftovers and spoiled food, coffee grounds, tea bags, pasta, bread and grains and cheese.
The cost to each town is in staff time, according to town officials.
Guilford First Selectman Matt Hoey talked about the importance of the program at a time when the state is at a “critical position relative to the disposal of solid waste.”
“There are estimates that up to 30 percent of the tonnage in solid waste is in food waste scraps,” he said.
He cited the closing of Hartford’s Materials Innovation and Recycling Authority waste-to-energy plant in July 2022 as a contributing factor.
“A significant amount of our solid waste is now being shipped out of state in various landfills,” he said. “This is an attempt to take a portion of what is in solid waste,
removing it and utilizing it for composting and, or, biodigesters for energy.”
Both the orange trash bags and green food scrap bags will be placed in the same container now used for resident’s curbside trash collection.
“It’s a great way to know it’s being handled appropriately and then it’s going to create energy in the end,” said Lyons. “Which I think is really exciting.”
Any resident can participate, when the pilot program begins, by bringing their food scraps to the Guilford-Madison Transfer Station at 1900 Boston Post Road,
Guilford. There will be specially designed bins for collection. No color-coded bags are needed.
“I would encourage people to have it in a bucket and just dump it in,” said Jonathan Walter, Madison engineering assistant.
All town officials embrace this program.
Hoey said he hopes, “The food waste diversion becomes ubiquitous through town and that the haulers, the private haulers, will expand their capacities to do this and eventually at a price that is affordable and reasonable. It would be wonderful.”
Walter echoed this, saying that
part of the pilot program is data collection and the town will study this to determine the future.
“Ideally it’ll be a townwide program that’s affordable, that all residents can participate in, the details of which haven’t been worked out at all yet,” he said.
Walters encourages everyone to be aware of the refuse problem and do what they can to reduce waste going to landfills.
“I think if it’s within an individual’s means that it’s a good thing for all of us to be doing,” he said. “We don’t see the problem because it’s kind of out of sight, most of the trash gets exported out of state so
we don’t have this big pile of trash in Connecticut that we stare at to see what the problem is.”
“But there is a problem that exists and we should be proactive in mitigating our trash problems going forward,” he said.
Lyons added that this is also a great educational tool.
“If you have kids at home, for them to understand trash is not just a thing that goes away somewhere, it has to go somewhere,” she said. “The repurposing is what I love about this because it’s going to be turning into energy, something we can all benefit from.”