UWindsor student gets head start on city-wide compost pickups

The provincial government wants every city and town to have green bin recycling by 2025. This means cities will have to offer organic waste collection — just like they do for bottles and cans.

For one Windsor man, seven years is too long to wait.

Dane Fader, a 21-year-old University of Windsor student, has just launched a company called GreenerBins Composting Company — offering customers weekly pickups of their organic waste.

Want something done right? Do it yourself

This was Fader's mindset when he moved back home to Windsor after briefly living in Toronto, Ont. and Halifax N.S. — two cities which have city-wide compost collection services.

Every week, 'GreenerBins' picks up customers' compost-filled buckets in exchange for an empty one.

"We take all that food waste and we compost it. We work with a variety of community partners [and] local farms where we can bring the food waste."

'GreenerBins' also returns the compost to its customers about three times a year — for free — so they can use it in their gardens.

Fader said 'GreenerBins' can be filled with almost anything that isn't accepted by the city's yard waste collection.

"Veggies, fruits, egg shells, meat, dairy, bones, tea bags, coffee grinds, animal hair, grass clippings, bread products."

Giving everyone the chance to compost

While it's normal for compost piles to attract worms and spiders which break down organic matter, unwanted guests like rats and flies can appear as well. And for people living in an apartment, there's virtually no option for composting — until now.

"They never have any mess or smell," Fader said, adding the buckets are "air-tight" and "water-tight."

"It's about the convenience factor ... I had a lady in LaSalle who said that she usually has three bags of garbage every week. This week, she only had two because of all the food waste that didn't have to go into the garbage."

One customer, Mark LeFebvre, said he is satisfied with the service and is excited to get back to composting after seeing problems in the past.

"With critters getting in to our composting, we actually had to stop, so this is a great solution for us," LeFebvre said.

The weekly pickup service costs $30 a month.

Hear more from Dane Fader on the CBC's Windsor Morning:

Increasing customer base

'GreenerBins' already has 38 customers — Fader's goal was to have 30 by this time.

But it's not just homeowners getting involved. Business have started to take notice of 'GreenerBins' as well.

John O'Kane, co-owner of John Max Sports & Wings, said the restaurant chain is already making a move toward becoming more friendly to the environment.

The restaurant recently made the move from takeout containers made from Styrofoam toward material which can be recycled when customers take food home.

"We moved over to a paper straw for our eight-inch milkshake straw. We're still looking for a six-inch straw," O'Kane said.

"We'd like to be an operation that cares about the environment and we do ... We're just trying to be more conscious of the way we treat our planet and our environment."

GreenerBins has definitely peaked the interest of O'Kane. He said any service which helps the business be more efficient when disposing organic matter is something he wants to be involved with.