There’s a growing grassroots movement afoot in Lawrence Township—in the truest sense of the word.
The township’s fledgling curbside organic waste disposal program, voluntary in nature, is in motion and modest in participation so far, but the goal is to nearly double participation in the near future. The program could take off, just as bottle, can and paper recycling did years back.
The program started two years ago when a committee of concerned volunteers came up with the idea. At the time, the township’s contract for garbage and recycling was up for renewal with Central Jersey Waste and the time seemed ripe to add an organic waste disposal element into the mix.
Participants put their organic waste bins on the curbside each Wednesday. Participation is completely voluntary and costs $17 a month, billed quarterly. The cost includes a 32-gallon green recycle cart and Bio Bags, in which the organic waste can be stored prior to depositing the cart curbside. Residents can also share the service with a neighbor in order to reduce the cost. Two neighbors sharing the service halves the cost to $8.50 per month.
“As we add more participants, the unit cost will drop, and when we achieve our goal of adding more local dropoff points for the organic waste, residents will really see a price drop,” said Greg Whitehead, township director of public works for the last 18 years.
Whitehead has been a proponent of the organic waste disposal program since its inception. There are 188 residents currently participating in the program, but Whitehead hopes to bump that up to at least 300 within the next two years. With a new contract coming in 2018, he added, it will be important to show Central Jersey Waste the program is not only healthy but expanding to ensure its renewal and continued viability.
Organic waste includes raw food, scraps, cooked food, meat, bones, paper towels, pizza boxes, fruit and vegetable peels, litter box material, coffee grounds, tea bags, fish, egg shells, non-Styrofoam egg cartons, waxed cardboard, oils, fats, butters, brown paper bags, paper take out containers, newspapers, office paper, fruits and nuts, breads, pasta, grains, liquids, sauces, houseplants, flower bouquets and dairy products. Every Wednesday, Central Jersey Waste takes the waste to a special facility where it is turned into usable soil and distributed to a farm in Pennsylvania.
“By participating, residents can doubly benefit,” Whitehead said. “They greatly reduce waste disposed in landfills and greatly enrich and conserve the soil. Once we expand participation and develop processing and delivery sites closer to Lawrence, the benefits to the community will be even more tangible.”
The program is estimated to reduce landfill space by 20 to 30 percent and perhaps most importantly, reduces the production and release of methane gas into the atmosphere. Methane is a greenhouse gas 21 times more potent than carbon dioxide emissions.
So far in 2016, the tonnage of organic waste recycled in the township has ranged from 5.2 to a high of 15.4 tons. According to Whitehead, August’s figure was 11.56 tons—a significant amount of recycled content and a large amount of waste kept out of landfills and reused for constructive purposes. It stands to reason that by doubling participation of residents there could well be a doubling of these very encouraging figures.
Whitehead has his own backyard composter, distinct and separate from the township program, so he’s a true believer in the power of organic waste recycling.
“If you think about it, you can recycle most things—tires, leaves, paint, oil, lightbulbs, electronics,” he said. “With a little creativity, you can find ways to recycle most things. It’s a heck of a lot better than putting things into the garbage in a landfill. Participants are very positive about the program so far. We are hoping to establish more and closer drop off points within the township to lower the price per month.”
Former Lawrence Township mayor and committee member Pam Mount, a farmer by profession, is a very proud and enthusiastic participant. But she recognizes the program needs a lift.
“Right now, the program has hit a plateau,” she said. “We really need to drive more participation to keep the program going, especially given Central Jersey Waste’s stipulation to do so. Single-stream recycling has made all recycling much more user friendly for the community, and organic waste disposal is certainly a part of that effort.”
Mount helped start the organization Sustainable New Jersey. “It’s absolutely critical that people get their arms around the proposition that humans significantly impact the climate,” she said. “Methane gas emission contributes greatly to global warming and to a far more significant extent than carbon dioxide. People can have a direct effect on methane emission simply by recycling organic food waste.”
Mount said that Dan Napoleon of the Mercer County Improvement authority has helped move the program forward. The MCIA does all the recycling, and at the Duck Island recycling facility, they are looking into an anaerobic food digester, which breaks down food in a sealed, oxygen-free tank. Eventually, Mount said, she hopes each part of the process can be done in Lawrence.
“People have to really become convinced of the value of recycling waste,” she said. “From my farming perspective, the history of civilization is one of wasting soil. This is the first generation trying to make new soil and put it back on earth. The other critical thing is the human impact on climate change, especially with methane generation in landfills. Just remember, anything that is made out of something that grows can be recycled.”
Mount said the next Sustainable Lawrence meeting on Oct. 6 will be an opportunity for prospective organic waste disposal participants to learn more about the program. The meeting will be held at town hall, and it starts at 7:30 p.m.
“If everyone currently enrolled just found one friend to join the program we’d hit our target of 300 pretty soon,” she said.
Teresita Bastides-Heron is another participant in the program, and like Mount, is very passionate about her participation and its positive impact on the community and the global environment.
“I like to recycle a lot of things, even wrapping paper, and make compost in my backyard,” she said.
Her own efforts to compost, outside of the formal program, further benefits the community. She is the President of the Greater Eldridge Park Neighborhood Association, which recently won the 18th Annual Lawrence Township Economic Development Award.
“I am a leader in my neighborhood, so I really have to set the example for my neighbors,” Bastides-Heron said. “I would love to see companies stop using plastic bags and use glass bottles instead of plastic. I have reusable bags for shopping. We really need to make the earth a healthier place for us all. It’s really a mindset, once you get used to recycling organic waste, just like it took time to recycle cans, bottles and newspapers way back when, it really becomes second nature.”
Residents can sign up for the program online at lawrencetwp.com/pw-organicwaste.html. Interested parties can also contact the Department of Public Works directly at (609) 587-1894. They can also send questions to jbrokofsky@lawrencetwp.com.
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