Fort Worth residents may have one more thing to recycle: food scraps

If recycling isn’t on the to-do list of Fort Worth residents now, it will be.

Residents can expect recycling to become an even greater part of their daily lives as the city looks to buy more time for its landfill. If nothing is done to preserve space, the landfill in far southeast Fort Worth will run out of room in a little more than two decades, according to a recent report.

Some of the ideas are simple, like enforcing bulk and brush separation for curbside collection so that the brush can always be recycled, and asking people to separate their glass and bringing it to drop-off locations, which keeps the glass cleaner and therefore more profitable in the recycling process. Another recommendation is to not allow grass clippings in the landfill, which would save tens of thousands of tons of waste, the report said.

And following in the footsteps of several large cities, the city will consider recycling food scraps. It would first conduct a pilot program to work out logistics, but residents would be asked to save food scraps, either in compost bags or plastic containers, which would be collected and used to make fertilizer.

“We haven’t selected the neighborhood or how it’s going to get collected,” said Brandon Bennett, the city’s code compliance director, the department that oversees solid waste services. “This is juicy stuff. You don’t want to be leaking chicken grease down the street.”

Moreover, access to recycling at public venues and at apartment communities needs to be encouraged, and residents should be allowed to recycle old clothes at the curbside.

All this is coming because city officials are concerned that the population growth rate, combined with an increase in construction and demolition materials being brought to the landfill, will drag down its life faster than they want.

Fort Worth is the fastest-growing big city in the country. The population grew 29 percent since 2006, to 854,113. It is expected to become the nation’s 12th-largest city in the next few years.

In 2011, estimates were that it would take 50 years for the landfill to run out of space. It now stands about about 22 years, said a consultant’s report, Rethinking Waste For a Green Fort Worth, a 20-year solid waste management plan that offers dozens of recommendations.

“We’re not in a crisis. We want to avoid a crisis,” Bennett said. “It is to some degree a wake-up call for those who are not participating in the recycling program, or those who do and could recycle more, because the better job we do at recycling, the longer the life of the landfill.”

That can be done by encouraging customers to use smaller garbage carts and larger recycling carts, the report said.

Recycling incentives

Recycling will impact peoples’ pocketbooks, Bennett said.

“When we look at a rate increase, we’re looking at a way to reward those that recycle more,” he said. “For those who recycle less, they would pay a higher premium for filling up the landfill quicker. If we reward those that recycle more then you’re going to see our recycle rate go up.”

The city owns the landfill, just south of Interstate 20 off Dick Price Road, but it’s operated by Republic Services. Nearly 234,000 tons of waste is collected annually from more than 217,000 residential customers. That averages a little more than 41 pounds per household, but of that, only about 9 pounds is recycled.

The city also operates four drop-off stations for residents to bring trash, recyclables and household chemicals and paint.

Fort Worth’s recycling goals are aggressive. By 2037, the city wants to divert at least 60 percent of the collected garbage from the landfill, and 80 percent by 2045.

Fort Worth started curbside recycling in 1991 with small bins. By 2003, residents were given carts, one for recycling and one for garbage. Before 2003, the city diverted 7 percent of waste from the landfill. Today, it’s about 21 percent.

Business involvement

Fort Worth wants more businesses to recycle, as well. Placing manageable recycling carts in business offices for paper is one way, Bennett said. A team of four employees will begin visiting businesses, much like a sales team, to get them on board with recycling, he said.

Residential waste only comprises about one-third of all the waste generated in the city; industrial, commercial and institutional waste comprises the remaining two-thirds. The landfill could be extended by as much as 10 years if much of that material is recycled.

“Based on our last study, 28 percent of what’s going to the landfill can be recycled; it just isn’t,” said Robert Smouse, Fort Worth’s assistant director of solid waste services.

The city of Arlington, which also owns its landfill, has about 48 years before it fills up, while Grand Prairie has about 41 years left on its landfill and Irving, 67 years, the report shows.

Bennett said enough changes can be made in the next two decades to slow the pace of the landfill, including partnering with other cities.

“We’re not the only one whose landfill is filling up,” he said.

This story was originally published October 19, 2017 at 11:22 AM with the headline "Fort Worth residents may have one more thing to recycle: food scraps."