Composting and You!

Composting at St. Lawrence University has increased due to the changes made to Dana Dining Center at the beginning of the semester by the Green House and Dining Services. Both back-of-house changes and student cooperation played a key role. 

One significant change was composting more leftover food from the dining hall. Marijo Haggett, the director of Dining Services, clarified what food could now be composted. “It was mostly just fruits and vegetables that we could compost. But now we are composting everything,” she said, explaining that all food, not just produce, could now be composted. 

In addition to composting more types of food, Dining Services has also changed where the composted food comes from. Lori Clark, assistant professor of Environmental Studies and Public Health, clarified where the composted food comes from. “You had kitchen scraps; you had the overproduction that just rolled out in the fall,” she explained, referring to the food that went unused during prep or uneaten at the end of the day. “And now, in January,” Clark continued, “we started the scrapped plates, which compose the majority of food waste.” The addition of student’s leftovers has contributed to composting.   

Student cooperation in the new system has been particularly helpful. Clark stated that despite the presence of both trash and compost bins in the dish return, students are composting correctly. “But what we are finding is that students are really scrapping their plates,” she said. “You know, giving the opportunity, and it’s convenient, it’s been pretty successful.” 

Originally, Dining Services and the Green House planned for composting to be done purely on the workers’ side. However, they modified the plan to involve the student body. “Probably students wouldn’t know about it,” stated Lucy Albrecht ’27, a member of the Green House that helped make the dining hall changes, “but we really wanted to push for a culture change, and we really wanted it to be on our side for that.” 

Composting food offers more than just social benefits for SLU; it also helps lower carbon emissions. According to Clark, increased composting has helped in multiple ways. “One is that we’re reducing the total mass that is getting transported long distance,” she stated, referring to how the nearest landfill is further than the compost site. 

Additionally, how food decomposes at composting sites is better for the environment than how it would decompose in a landfill. “When food waste goes in a landfill, it’s the number one ingredient in a landfill that makes methane gas,” Clark stated. She explained that the presence of oxygen in composting sites is what allows the food to break down without methane production. 

In addition to all the changes already made, Dining Services has plans to further reduce waste on campus. Haggett said that Dining Services is looking to reduce waste from the NorthStar Café. “Sometimes it’s not specifically the food; it’s thinking about all of the containers that we use,” she stated, referring to the to-go containers used every day, most of which end up in a landfill. 

Diane Husic, executive director of the Center for the Environment, would also like to reduce waste from special events. “One way to do this is to have an app to alert students and others on campus after an event that there is leftover food available for some limited time and to ‘come and get it,'” she explained. 

Even though other waste producers are still being evaluated by Dining Services, the Green House plans to make more changes to Dana. “So, I think our next step is more getting more communication out and perfecting Dana and things like that,” Albrecht said, “but maybe way in the future, we’ll have compostable little to-go containers, but they’re really expensive.”