Green Cart
WHAT GOES - Put these in your Green Cart
- Fruits, including pits, rinds, and seeds
- Vegetables, including seeds
- Dairy and eggshells
- Cooked meat and seafood, including bones and shells
- Bread, grains, pasta, and nut shells
- Coffee grounds
- Spoiled food and uneaten food from a meal
- Grass, weeds, leaves, and plant trimmings
- Branches, unpainted and untreated wood scraps, small logs, and woody shrubs
WHAT DOESN'T - Never put these in your Green Cart
- Raw meat
- Liquids
- Fats, oils, and grease
- Compostable foodware products (bio plastic, fiber-based containers, bio utensils)
- Plastic and plastic bags
- Paper and cardboard
- Glass and metal
- Food stickers
- Rubber bands and twist ties
- Diapers, pet waste, and trash
- Garden hoses, broken lawn chairs, ceramic and plastic flower pots
- Concrete
- Dirt and sod
- Hazardous Waste
- Railroad ties
- Telephone poles
- Particle board
- Yucca, agave, palm, cactus, bamboo, pampas, poison oak
- Wood covered in aluminum or foam
Food Scraps
Your green cart also accepts everyday food waste that would otherwise go to landfill, where it creates harmful greenhouse gases. This includes fruits and vegetables, dairy and eggshells, cooked meat and seafood (including bones and shells), bread, grains, pasta, coffee grounds, and spoiled or uneaten food. Even plate scrapings and prepared foods can go in the cart. By keeping food scraps out of the trash, we can turn them into compost that helps nourish soil and conserve resources.
How to Collect Your Food Scraps
#1
Choose a container like a bowl or pail. Put it in a convenient place in the kitchen.
#2
Collect your food scraps from meal prep, after a meal, and from cleaning out the fridge.
#3
Place food scraps in your green cart. (Note: Plastic bag liners cannot be placed in the green cart.)
What About … ?
Have No Fear. Nothing Goes to Waste!
Even the Undesirables?
Food scraps come from unwanted trimming from meal prep, those last bits of a meal, and food that’s been in the fridge too long. That toast that got a bit too toasty and those strawberries dressed in blue fuzz? That’s compost. They go in the green cart too.
Wait, Donuts Don’t Grow?
If you have your hands on your hips right now, we understand. The rule has some exceptions! Manufactured, processed, and prepared foods go in the green cart as well. That means all those yummy goods like pizza, chicken nuggets, cookies ect.
Tips for Kitchen Storage and Keeping Your Cart Clean
Here are some easy tips on how to prevent fruit flies and odors in both your kitchen as well as green cart:
KEEP A ROUTINE
Take your scraps to your cart every few days, even if not full. Remember that plastic should never be placed in the cart as it will ruin the compost!
SMART KITCHEN STORAGE
- Use a kitchen container that works for you, such as a kitchen pail. Or you can just repurpose an old container: large yogurt or ice cream tubs are great no-cost options!
- Freeze it – Scraps can be stored in the freezer to avoid odors.
- Use a lid – A tight fitting lid on your container will help keep flies away. A vented lid will prevent flies and also prevent anaerobic (rotting) stinky!
- Wash – your kitchen container thoroughly with detergent as needed. Most containers are dishwasher safe as well!
- Put melon scraps immediately into your food and yard waste cart and cover.
- In your green cart, cover food scraps with yard waste.
- Sprinkle baking soda in the kitchen container and food and yard waste cart to reduce odors.
- Additional Storage. Keep a 5 gallon bucket with tight fitting lid by your green cart. Fill that with food scraps and empty it into the green cart before you wheel it out to the curb. This keeps your food scraps contained and sealed all week and will lessen files and odor in your cart.
- If you end up with a fruit fly invasion, use a vacuum cleaner to remove the fruit flies.
- Shade– keep your cart in a shady area to stop it from getting too smelly.
NEED MORE ROOM IN YOUR TRASH CART?
Place food scraps, where they belong, in your green cart.
DON’T HAVE A KITCHEN PAIL? DON’T WORRY, YOU CAN USE ANYTHING.
OUR FRIENDS USE THESE:
What’s the Big Deal with Food Scraps?
Believe it or not, food is the single largest contributor to U.S. landfills today. When food scraps make their way into landfills, they break down and produce a harmful greenhouse gas called methane. This gas is a major source of climate pollution and is 86 times more potent than carbon dioxide. Too much of these greenhouse gasses heats our planet to an unsustainable level. Present day, we are far above the desired limit for these gasses. In the Salinas Valley, food scraps are approximately 30 percent of the overall waste stream (approximately 66,700 tons).
Removing food scraps from our landfills is one easy way to immediately start decreasing methane emissions. By simply disposing of your food scraps in your green cart, we’ll transform them into compost that can help our gardens grow. Compost made from food scraps is not only nutrient-rich, but also helps trap moisture in the soil. This means that we can use this compost to limit the amount of irrigation water needed.
REDUCE WASTE GOING TO OUR LANDFILLS
In the landfill, food scraps go to waste, but in your green cart they become compost for our farms and home gardens.
HOW ELSE CAN I REDUCE MY ‘FOODPRINT’?
Here are some easy tips:
- Buy less food at one time to reduce the amount wasted.
- Donate any non-perishable items to your local food banks.
- Find new and creative ways to use your leftover food, such as trying new recipes or adding leftovers to new meals.
- Use the peels! Potato peel chips or apple peel tea are two great options.
- Store your food properly so that it lasts longer.
- Use your freezer to prolong the life of certain foods.
- Double-check date labels to make sure nothing is expiring soon.
With up to 40% of all foods in the United States never eaten, there is a lot of room for improvement. Consumers are responsible for more wasted food than grocery stores and restaurants combined, so changing your own behavior can have major positive consequences. Do your part to keep food from going to waste. Learn more at our Stop Food Waste page.
WHAT IF I ALREADY USE MY FOOD SCRAPS?
Do you already use your food scraps to compost at home or to feed your animals? No need to worry! Continue using them and just place any excess in your green cart, so we can take care of the rest. Are you interested in learning more about creating compost in your own backyard? Take a look at our all-in-one resource to help you go from a composting newbie to an expert.
A Note on SB 1383
The Short-Lived Climate Pollutants Act establishes targets for statewide reductions in organic waste by 2025 in California:
- 75% reduction in the level of the statewide disposal of organic waste from the 2014 level.
- Recover more than 20% of currently disposed of edible food for human consumption.
This legislation aims to reduce the presence of food scraps in our landfills and thereby reduce methane emissions. We can all play our part in making these goals a reality. Find more info at: https://svswa.org/commercial/organics/sb1383/
Food Scraps Compost = Healthier Soil and Cleaner Air
Yard Waste
Your green cart accepts a wide range of yard and landscape materials that help keep organics out of the landfill and turn outdoor trimmings into useful compost. This includes grass, leaves, weeds, branches, plant and flower trimmings, and small pieces of untreated natural wood. When properly sorted, these materials help produce clean, high-quality compost while supporting a healthier environment and reducing contamination in the organics stream.
Contamination
Keeping trash and non-organics materials out of your Green cart helps you avoid contamination fees from your waste hauler and keeps the compost clean.
Contaminated yard waste causes extra processing labor and possible rejection of loads (a rejected load goes to the landfill). These images are from contaminated loads at Johnson Canyon Composting Facility.
Holiday Trees
Holiday trees are accepted, cut in 3-foot sections, in your Green Cart year-round.
Holiday trees can also be dropped off for FREE at Johnson Canyon Landfill and Jolon Road Transfer Station from December 26th through January 31st of every year.
- Trees must be cut into 3 ft. sections
- Remove all tinsel, lights, and decorations
- Remove plastic, wooden, and metal stands
- Flocked trees are NOT accepted
- The trees will be chipped and composted, not landfilled.
What happens to the material in your Green Cart?
At Atlas Organics, we recycle yard trimmings and food scraps and keep it out of landfills, then turn it into a valuable soil amendment to promote sustainable agriculture and landscaping. We provide a quality soil amendment product for landscapers, farmers, nurseries and home growers
Recycled Landscape Materials for Sale (Atlas)
The materials collected in the green carts or dumpsters throughout the Salinas Valley are recycled into products for use in your yard and garden.
