EVERETT — Coffee grounds, chicken bones and banana peels from Everett homes soon will be turned into garden soil, not garbage heaps.
Rubatino Refuse Removal, Everett’s main trash hauler, plans to begin offering food-waste recycling to all its residential customers beginning this week.
Customers can toss food scraps, including bones, meat, dairy products and nut shells, into the big green bin along with the yard waste. They also can chuck food-soiled paper such as pizza boxes and napkins.
Plastic needs to stay out of the yard waste bins.
The company serves 18,000 residential customers in Everett and some parts of Mukilteo. Rubatino also plans to begin slowly offering the service to its 4,000 commercial customers.
Rubatino doesn’t know exactly how much of their customers’ trash is food waste but they know it’s a lot, said Larry Goulet, Rubatino’s office manager.
Nationwide Americans chuck more than a quarter of food prepared, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. All that waste gets carted to the landfill, where it hogs space and turns into methane, a greenhouse gas.
Food-waste recycling programs like this one are becoming more common. Two of Snohomish County’s largest trash collectors, Waste Management and Allied Waste, already offer it. In Seattle, all single family homes must sign up for table scrap recycling — whether they want it or not.
In Everett, the recycling program is optional.
Rubatino had mulled food-waste recycling for some time but initially was deterred by the high cost of contracting with Cedar Grove Composting, Goulet said. The have since negotiated a favorable contract with the north Everett company, which already takes food and yard waste from King County and turns it into garden compost.
Rubatino isn’t upping the $8.90 a week rate for picking up the yard and food waste bin. However, it is increasing the pickup of the bin from once a month in the winter months to once a week and charging for those extra collections.
The company still isn’t sure if the move will save or cost Rubatino money. There will be less garbage to pay dump fees on but customers may choose to cancel their yard waste bins rather than pay for extra pick up dates or downsize their regular trash cans.
“I don’t know how it’s going to pencil out,” Goulet said.
To kick off the program, Rubatino, along with the city of Everett, is offering free kitchen food scrap containers, while the supplies last.
The containers should be available by mid-week at both at Rubatino’s office, 2812 Hoyt Ave., and at the city’s utility billing office, 3101 Cedar St. To prove you are a customer, bring a Rubatino bill.
Debra Smith: 425-339-3197, dsmith@heraldnet.com.
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