• Why is it important to dispose of our food waste correctly?
• How is food waste recycled?
• What can businesses do to reduce the amount of food waste they create?
• What’s the current state of legislation around food waste?
• What can I do to improve food waste collection?
• Some environmentalists are dubious of biofuels. Can you explain the difference between biofuel created from crops and from waste?
• What is the future of food waste?

Why is it important to dispose of our food waste correctly?

The biggest reason is to prevent food waste from going to landfill.

When food waste ends up in landfill, it decomposes and creates methane, a gas which has a warming potential 21 times that of CO2e. Methane from human activity accounts for at least 25% of global warming today, and 20% of those emissions are from the waste sector alone.

By establishing a circular economy with our food waste, we can limit the amount of organic matter that ends up in landfills and reduce the amount of methane in our atmosphere. Less food going in the rubbish bin + a cooler planet = a win for all.

How is food waste recycled?

In the UK, food waste is most commonly recycled through anaerobic digestion – a process where bacteria breaks down organics in an oxygen-deprived environment. Waste collection companies like Keenan Recycling use anaerobic digestion at their facilities to turn food and garden waste into compost, or into biofuels which are then sold to the energy grid.

Reusing our food waste has many environmental benefits, besides just avoiding methane emissions. ‘For example, our compost gets sold to farmers, who then plow it into their fields, which encourages carbon sequestration,’ says Grant. ‘Also that [compost] is displacing chemical fertiliser, which is made from fossil fuels and often travels huge distances.

What can businesses do to reduce the amount of food waste they create?

While proper waste management is critical, the best thing we can do is to reduce the amount of waste we’re creating in the first place.

For Keenan Recycling, which works primarily with hotels and restaurants, they encourage their customers to look at things like portion control and takeaway bags, which reduce the amount of wastage that occurs from having to throw away perfectly good, uneaten food.

‘We also advise supermarkets not to do any “buy one, get one free” deals,’ says Grant. ‘Say Tesco has a deal on pineapples. We’ll be able to spot an influx of pineapples coming into our operations soon after, as people tend to eat the first one and chuck the second one.’

For organisations with workforces that are primarily desk-based, there are a lot of ways to encourage employees to reduce their food waste:

• Provide appropriate waste bins.
• Encourage employees to share and swap the food they don’t want to eat over internal comms.
• Educate people on food labelling so that food isn’t chucked into the bin before its time.
• Encourage recipe sharing which makes good use of leftovers, like these easy-breezy fermentation projects. The planet and your gut will thank you for it.

What’s the current state of legislation around food waste?

Since 2014, every Scottish local authority must offer a household food waste collection, and any service that produces or handles food must recycle their waste. There is also a pending legal ban on any organic matter going to landfill, which will come into effect in 2025.

There is currently no legal requirement around food waste collection in England, though there are plans to implement a law which stipulates that all households, businesses and organisations must have a food waste stream by 2023.

Despite this current gap in legislation, Grant says there is clear demand for their services; the difficulty is finding appropriate outlets to receive and process this waste. ‘We need more composting plants, and unfortunately there just aren’t enough of them in England,’ says Grant. Without government support and the proper legislation, he adds, it’s difficult for waste collectors to build the necessary infrastructure to process the waste correctly.

What can I do to improve food waste collection?

First and foremost, we’ve got to use the food waste service we’ve currently got.

‘I speak to loads of folk that go, “I don’t have a green bin”, or “I didn’t know what that bin was for”’ says Grant. In Scotland, every local authority must offer a household food waste collection, so it’s vital that we use it. Check your local council’s website to find out more about how food waste is collected in your area.

For those living in England, the next step is to ask questions of those in charge, and make it clear that food waste collection is a public priority. ‘I would be asking questions of their local authority – are you going to provide us with food waste services? If they’re having lunch or dinner somewhere, I’d be asking that restaurant if they recycle your food waste.’

Some environmentalists are dubious of biofuels. Can you explain the difference between biofuel created from crops and from waste?

The end product is the same, but the processes are distinctly different. Waste collectors like Keenan Recycling create second-generation biofuels, as they’re derived from non-fuel biomass, like plant and animal waste (UNCTAD).

Biofuels can also be created as an agricultural process, wherein farmers grow crops and silage to be turned into biofuels via anaerobic digestion. These biofuels are called first-generation biofuels, and though they’re still a renewable energy source, there are concerns that first-generation biofuels could have negative impacts on global food security and biodiversity if managed unsustainably (Mike Berners-Lee, There Is No Planet B).

What is the future of food waste?

‘I think anaerobic digestion might get eclipsed in the next 10 to 20 years, when we start looking at waste differently,’ says Grant. ‘For example, there’s a worldwide shortage of protein, so can we build a plant that could extract the protein from waste?’ He cites examples of insect farming, such as that of the black soldier fly, which can digest food waste and create proteins that can then be used again as biodiesel or food ingredients.

‘Currently something is only recognised as going from a waste to a product if it achieves [either] the BSI PAS110 certification through anaerobic digestion, or BSI PAS100 through composting. Those are the only routes to turning waste into a product at the moment. If you don’t do one of those two things, then it’s still classed as a waste product and you can’t do anything with it.’

‘You can have the fanciest technology in the world, but if it doesn’t comply with the legislation, then it’s no good,’ says Grant. ‘We have to look through a different lens to see what tech is emerging and how that can potentially change the world. And then it’s a case of legislation keeping pace with the technology.’