Marlene’s Market in Federal Way is among grocery stories that have taken an innovative approach to reducing organic waste after new regulations came into effect in January.
As of January 2024, Federal Way businesses that produce at least eight cubic yards of organic material per week are required to have it collected and sent to the right type of processing facility. Organic waste refers to food and yard scraps, and needs to be processed differently from recycling or garbage.
At Marlene’s, they’ve started a community compost system for deli and produce — bagging up rotting fruits and vegetables and deli trimmings, then selling them for 99 cents a pound, according to a representative from Waste Management, which services Federal Way.
The change came as part of House Bill 1799 that includes over 20 law changes related to methane emissions in Washington state.
A presentation on Feb. 15, 2023, from Sound Cities Association and Cedar Grove went over the history of the bill and featured speakers who have been through similar policy and practical changes around organic waste disposal in their own communities.
Heather Trim is the executive director of ZeroWaste Washington and reminded her audience of the “heat dome that happened two years ago and how intense it was,” and said that is just “a reminder that the reason we are doing these types of bills. It is about climate change.”
So what do food scraps have to do with the weather? Trim went over the basics in the presentation, explaining how methane is a greenhouse gas, which means it is similar to carbon dioxide in that it traps heat from the sun and allows less of it to radiate back into space.
According to the Washington Department of Ecology: “Methane has more than 80 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide over a 20-year period and is responsible for more than 25% of the temperature impacts coming from climate change today. In landfills, methane is produced by the decomposition of food, vegetation and other organic materials.”
When these food scraps, vegetation and other organic materials rot without having being exposed to oxygen, they produce methane. In proper composting facilities, these materials can be broken down and transformed into the useful product of compost, rather than rotting and producing a greenhouse gas.
Representatives from WM connected with 20 out of the 21 grocery stores in Federal Way last year before the law went into effect to make sure they were set up for success. They also had 193 individual conversations and educated businesses at 13 strip malls in Federal Way about recycling.
In the 6 months since the laws have gone into effect, a representative from WM said that they’ve seen an “increase in composting tonnages to 2024,” but couldn’t share details about compliance levels. The data that shows an increase in composting tonnage also includes multifamily residential properties, so exact numbers about the results of this law change are not yet available.
The law requires that businesses that produce over the threshold of eight cubic yards per week pay for organic waste disposal. This is equivalent to about 67 of the largest size of residential curbside waste containers, according to WM.
WM couldn’t share exactly what the cost to businesses are of this new law because Federal Way has a fee cap that limits how much any business will have to pay for waste removal, including garbage, single stream recycling and/or compost. If a business had already hit that fee cap, their cost would not have increased at all to add more organic waste removal services.
A WM employee shared that “for a business, we find that setting up an effective and efficient organics system is about education, equipment, signage and staff training. WM’s outreach team is trained to educate and support businesses to set up smart systems and fine tune them over time. We go onsite to help businesses and we provide helpful resources.”
