Learn how composting is good for the environment, and good for your wallet too!
- Reduce Council Money Spent on Landfill-Fees: Food-waste makes-up approximately 35% of the rubbish that goes into the average household rubbish-bin and landfill. Due to the overall high amounts of rubbish being created in Queensland, and the limited amount of landfill space available, from 1st July 2019 the Queensland Government is introducing a ‘waste levy’ on all rubbish that goes into landfill. This ‘waste-levy’ will have to be paid for by most local Councils, including the Cassowary Coast. By composting food-scraps, less waste is sent to landfill, the Cassowary Coast Council pays less landfill-fees, and then rate-payers’ money isn’t being wasted on well… waste.
- Save Your Rates From Being Spent on Landfill-Fees: Due to the Cassowary Coast’s high levels of rainfall, all of our ‘wet waste’ (including food-scraps) has to go to a landfill site in Mareeba so that it doesn’t contaminate our surface-water and ground-water. The Cassowary Coast is the ONLY local council in Queensland that has to do this, and it costs them and rate-payers an estimated $1,000,000 (one million dollars) a year. On top of the new ‘waste-levy’, this could cost the Council even more money each year. By properly composting food-scraps, this means you’ll be helping Council to spend less of your rates on landfill-fees.
- Reduce Greenhouse-Gas Emissions: Sending food-waste to landfill makes greenhouse-gases. Because there’s not enough oxygen or micro-organisms in landfill, the food-scraps rot and create methane – a greenhouse-gas that is 30-times more powerful than carbon-dioxide. However, when food-scraps are composted in the proper environment rich with oxygen and micro-organisms, they do not create methane. Adding compost to soil also increases the soil’s ability to act as a carbon-sink, by absorbing and holding-in carbon-dioxide from the atmosphere!
- Create Your Own Healthy Fertiliser and Soil: Compost is a powerful fertiliser that enriches and aerates soil with beneficial microbes, organic matter, and a combination of nutrients and minerals needed for healthy plant growth. This then reduces the need for chemical, non-organic, and store-bought fertilisers.