The Dirt on Composting

Composting!

Talk about composting and the natural response is ‘EW – Gross!’ but composting is recycling! Composting is the natural process of organic matter breaking down. This organic material can be plant material or animal matter (dinner scraps, yard waste even paper towels). If you’ve ever walked in the woods, you’ve experienced compost in its most natural setting.

Why compost?

Keeping organic waste out of our landfills by composting conserves precious landfill space, reduces production of methane from anaerobic waste decomposition in the landfill and reduces the amount of energy used by garbage trucks carting off our waste.

Up to twenty percent of a communities waste can be food waste. Anaerobic decomposition of organic waste such as food waste and yard waste in landfills is the #1 producer of methane gas in the United States. When not controlled (methane can be harnessed and used as a renewable energy source) and simply vented to the atmosphere, methane gas is the most potent of all the greenhouse gases contributing twenty-five times as much to climate change as carbon dioxide.

Using compost in your home lawn and garden will also reduce your dependency on chemical fertilizers, saving you money and reducing – if not eliminating - the potential of chemical pollution to your little piece of the environment.

How to compost?

There are as many different ways to compost as there are people who compost!

You need four basic ingredients: oxygen, water, carbon ("Brown material such as wood chips, brown leaves, or shredded newspaper), and nitrogen ("Green" wet waste such as grass clippings, or fruit and vegetable scraps). If you have these ingredients, you can compost at your home, office, or school.

Many people prefer a tidy structure for their organic waste, whether it be a commercially available composting bin or a home-made one – if you have organic matter you can’t avoid decomposition! Each method has its pros and cons, depending on where you live and your composting goals.

For more information on commercially available composting units visit:

http://www.mastercomposter.com
http://www.composters.com

Compost is good; sloppy garbage heaps and rotting food are bad.

For more information on composting methods or services in Clark County visit:

http://www.springspreserve.org/apps/video/index.cfml?cid=77&vid=420

http://www.a1organics-nevada.com/

http://projectangelfaces.org/

Not ready to collect your food scraps? A good start in your composting journey is to start collecting and separating your yard waste. Green waste is often collected in municipal curbside collection or can be dropped off with private waste management contractor businesses and processed into mulch.

For more information on yard waste collection in Clark County visit or call:

http://www.cityofhenderson.com/parks/special_events/christmas_tree_recycling.php

Liberty Salvage Material (702) 880-1299

Composting will take you one step closer to living more sustainablely!