Oak Hill will this week become the first city in Tennessee to implement a city-wide residential composting collection program. This is an expansion of “Recycle First, Trash Last,” the city’s recycling program launched last year.

Run by Earth Savers, Oak Hill has recycled more than 400 tons by the end of its first year through the program and adding the compost component will save tons more.

“The EPA estimates that the average US citizen throws away nine pounds of food waste a week,” says Bobby Bandy, president of Earth Savers. “If you have a family of four, that is 36 pounds a week. Multiply that out for a year and it really adds up.”

Oak Hill is contracting with Earth Savers with a goal of "diverting waste from the landfill."

Earth Savers will pick up table scraps, spoiled food, fruit and vegetable peels and cores, coffee grounds and meat waste. Food-contaminated paper such as pizza boxes and paper towels also will be accepted for compost.

Bandy says customers will be provided with biodegradable bags that can be filled with the food waste, tied up and put in their regular recycling bin for pickup.

Getting the composting program off the ground had been on Bandy’s mind for a while, but it took some time to launch.

“We have been recycling in Nashville almost for 10 years now, and over the last five years I have been looking into what has been going on nationally with food waste, wondering if that was something we could do for our customers,” Bandy says. “There were some barriers for a few years with solid waste rules with the state. They viewed food compost as a bio-hazard initially, but in the last year they have decided to reevaluate that.”

Then, when The Compost Company got permission to do small volume food-waste composting in Ashland City, Bandy was able to move forward with the collection program.

“Once we had somebody who could process it and had a good business model, then we felt like we could offer this type of collection to our customers,” Bandy says. “We are focused toward diverting waste from the landfill and recycling does that. Food compost is the natural next step for us.”

If everyone participates in the new composting program, Bandy says, Oak Hill would divert an additional 15 percent of its trash volume from the landfill. His family of four recycles and composts, he adds, and has only had to put out garbage twice since the beginning of the year.

“A home can divert from a landfill, easily, 80 percent of their trash, and that is conservative he says. “If you are really concerned about that type of thing and don’t want to mess with compost in your backyard, then this is away to do that.”