Vancouver launches food scrap recycling pilot project

The City of Vancouver is taking a step towards full recycling of all food scraps, starting with a pilot project in September.

The goal of the program is to divert all food waste away from the landfill, and reduce the city's dumping volume by half in nine years.

The plan will call for the residents of 2,000 homes in the Riley Park and Sunset neighbourhoods to put all food waste into their green-lidded yard waste bins, which will be picked up once a week.

All other non-organic garbage will go in the bin with the black lid, which will be picked up once every two weeks.

Could go citywide

The program also will sharply reduce the amount of methane produced in the landfill, said Councillor Andrea Reimer.

"Food waste is what creates the greenhouse gas from the landfill," Reimer said. "We figure if we could get all the food scraps out, it would be the equivalent of taking 10,000 cars off the road."

The diverted food scraps will go to Fraser Richmond Soil and Fibre, a company that composts food scraps and then sells the soil to the landscaping and agricultural industry.

Reimer said if the pilot program is successful, a citywide program would begin early next year.

Eight other Lower Mainland municipalities already have similar programs in place.