Winnipeg's compost drop-off program 'incredibly successful', tripling expected totals

Winnipeg's community drop-off composting program has exploded in popularity with triple the amount of organic waste being contributed over what was expected.

It's been two months since the city set up 15 sites where Winnipeggers can drop off their household organic waste. The material is picked up by Compost Winnipeg, a social enterprise run by the non-profit Green Action Centre.

"[It has been] incredibly successful. There's a reason we've been kind of a little bit silent on its success is because we're so busy … just trying to keep up with the demand," said Karrie Blackburn, the sales and customer service lead for Compost Winnipeg.

That includes scheduling many more collections and meeting with city staff about opening more drop-off sites, she says.

"We tried to have it on a weekly basis — the collections — but it's been so popular that we've had to go to sometimes three times per week," Blackburn said. "Each week we're right at the rim of the bins. It's exceptional."

The program started Oct. 15 with 15 food waste drop-off stations located at the city's 4R depots and community centres.

The intent is to reduce the impact of climate change. For every tonne of food waste diverted from a landfill, two tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions are kept out of the atmosphere, the city said in a news release in October.

Within the first week, the program gathered 1,578 kilograms of food waste. Two months in, the total is some 40,000 kilograms of organics being diverted from the landfill, Blackburn said.

"Each week it's grown considerably over the next."

Its popularity really grew after Halloween, when people were looking to unload their pumpkins, Blackburn says.

"What we found is that just kind of put composting into people's hands, realizing where the the drop-offs were, and then they were just basically translating that behaviour from a pumpkin to household weekly waste," she said.

"So it wasn't just like a one-off. It really was people introducing better waste management practice into their households."

There were some growing pains initially with bins overflowing but now there are "community compost bin caretakers" keeping an eye on things, Blackburn said.

"Three times a week they visit bins and take photos to send to us so we know the state of how much content is in each bin."

In addition to more collection times, Compost Winnipeg has boosted the number of bins at the existing sites. When the program started, there were four bins at each site.

One of the most popular sites, Dakota Community Centre, now has seven "and then most other stations have anywhere between five and six bins," Blackburn said.

"It just shows that this is something super necessary within our community."

The city ran a two-year curbside pilot project, collecting food waste in green carts from select households in several areas of Winnipeg between 2020-2022.

That led to the present project with drop-off stations, which is expected to continue until a city-wide green cart program can be introduced in 2030. 

"The reason for that 2030 timeline is because we don't have a facility large enough to process the 38,000 tons of organic waste that Winnipeggers produce annually," Blackburn said.

Right now, the current waste is taken to the Prairie Green Landfill north of the city, where there is a large-scale composting facility to process the organics, she says.

"Prairie Green, though, has a maximum capacity of 4,000 to 5,000 tonnes, so you can see how our city produces a lot more than any facility that exists currently [can handle]," she said.

"So at this time the city is looking for a facility to be built in Winnipeg to be able to process all of [those] organics and then they can roll out the program."

Things that can be dropped into the bins include scraps of fruit, vegetables, meat, bones, dairy and paper packaging.

So far, Winnipeggers have been mindful about what they put in, including the types of containers holding their waste, Blackburn says.

"Using a BPI certified compostable bag has been a common practice for most. Paper bags have also been used, which is great. And those who choose not to use a bag, they've been great about wrapping it either in newspaper or just tossing it in directly to the bin, which we've been so pleased with," she said.

In addition to food waste, there have also been a lot of pizza boxes dropped off, which Blackburn is happy to see. Those boxes can't be recycled if they're soiled with food, but they can be composted. And that keeps them out of the landfill.

"The only message we would love to share with the community is to please rip up or tear up the pizza box before sending it to the compost bins," Blackburn said.

"They're a bulky item. If they're quartered it makes them fit in the bin a lot easier and it also ensures we have enough space between collection days."