Why we should compost?

Approximately half of what Auckland households send to landfill is compostable material. 10% is from the garden and whopping 45% is from the kitchen. This food waste alone weighs in at about 90,000 tonnes each year.

And what a waste it is!

When your food scraps are mixed with other rubbish in the landfill we lose all that valuable nutrient forever.

But it gets worse.

Once buried it doesn’t compost down. Compost needs air and there is no air in landfill. Instead it rots down anaerobically causing problems that then have to be managed.

Liquid from the rotting waste slowly filters through the landfill, washing out all the nasties. To stop that contaminated leachate from polluting our waterways, it has to be collected and treated onsite.

Landfill Process — Click image to enlarge

The other big problem is that when organic waste rots down anaerobically it gives off Methane gas (CH4). Methane is a significant Greenhouse gas, being 25 times more potent at trapping heat in the atmosphere than Carbon Dioxide (CO2).Modern landfills do capture some of that methane but not all of it.
But its not all bad!

There is something easy you can do to help fix all those problems. Instead of sending your kitchen and garden waste of to the landfill, simply compost it onsite.

Whether its a worm farm, Bokashi system or a simple compost bin you can easily turn all your household kitchen and garden waste into a valuable resource, that can feed your garden or even your pot plants.

Choosing the right system that suits you and learning how to use it properly is the trick though. And this is where the Compost Collective is here to help. So have a read through the site, do a quiz, attend a course or just check in with one of our friendly team.

We are here to help.