September 6, 2024
From Truckee.com: An Insider’s Guide, Summer 2024
When many think of composting, a lot of work, worms, and buying a large rotating bin that would only fit in your yard come to mind. It’s actually easy to compost in Truckee. There are small, counter-sized composting buckets with lids and charcoal air filters that you can purchase inexpensively, but really any container with a lid will do and all you need is a 5-gallon Home Depot bucket with a lid in your garage or utility closet to dump it into.
Because of our high altitude and long winter season, what is accepted for Truckee composting is a bit different than in other warmer climates in California – compostable bags, coffee filters, or pizza boxes or any kind of paper bags that might be accepted elsewhere are not accepted in Truckee-Tahoe, but almost all food waste can be composted and there is free composting available year-round in Truckee. You might wonder why Raley’s O-N-E Market and other earth-conscious markets provide compostable bags for fruits and vegetables if they can’t be composted locally. Even though the bags can’t go in our local compost, these bags still do the job of eliminating more plastics and they break down in our landfill.
Food scraps ONLY!
There are three year-round drop off locations and the Community Garden in the Truckee River Regional Park accepts compost materials from May – October. The compost dropped off at the park goes directly into the Demonstration Garden that is harvested for our seniors and others in the community in need.
Drop-Off Locations:
Dumpster located near front driveway
10050 Brockway Rd
(Park near the kid’s playground and walk west along the path)
Composting not only saves room in your trash and eliminates smell, but keeps food waste out of the landfill, which can help prevent potent greenhouse gasses from being released as it breaks down. Specifically, compost and mulch help California adapt to climate change by sequestering carbon, reducing greenhouse gas emissions, conserving water, reducing erosion, and reducing flooding and mudslides. Composting also reduces energy use by using local food waste as mulch, instead of shipping in fertilizers and other soil treatments. Compost is used at regional facilities to nourish soil for local gardens, such as Slow Food Tahoe’s Demonstration Garden in Truckee River Regional Park, that serves the community with food donations to local seniors and through Sierra Community House.
Because of these conservation benefits, in January 2024 the Climate Transformation Alliance (CTA) awarded a grant to the “Waste Diversion Divas” for their Food Waste Diversion in Truckee-Tahoe project. This project will provide public education and outreach on the importance and benefits of composting and will also provide more opportunities for at-home composting in the community.
