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Will you be impacted by the food waste changes in Mass.? Here’s what to know.

The state estimates that the new ban will encompass about 2,000 more businesses and institutions.

Wasted food collected from waste management service Divert's retail customers is processed at an anaerobic digestion facility in Freetown, MA. Divert processes more than 232,000 tons of wasted food a year at its 10 facilities across the country. (Courtesy of Divert)

By Clara McCourt

November 1, 2022

2 minutes to read

Massachusetts is tightening up its ban on commercial-scale food waste.

According to an announcement by the state Department of Environmental Protection, any business producing more than half a ton of food waste per week cannot send it to landfills or incinerators as of Nov. 1. This halves the state’s previous ban, which affected businesses producing one ton of food waste.

The ban also takes aim at textiles, such as clothes and household linens, and mattresses.

Who is affected?

While Massachusetts residents throw away large amounts of uneaten food every day, this food waste ban isn’t targeted at individual households.

Here’s what you need to know about the textile and mattress waste ban that goes into effect Nov. 1

The new food waste changes impact large-scale generators of food waste, like grocery stores, wholesale distributors, resorts, large restaurants, and even institutions like colleges and universities.

The state estimates that about 2,000 businesses were affected by the original ban, and the new ban will encompass about 2,000 more. About half of these businesses could be restaurants, according to state estimates, but it still makes up a small portion of restaurants overall.

The stricter ban likely won’t create financial difficulties for restaurant owners — industry advocates say the cost of sustainably diverting food waste is often comparable to throwing it away.

For business owners who may be concerned about if the ban affects them, government program RecyclingWorks has created an estimation guide encompassing everything from hospitals to hotels.

A full list of food waste generators is available here.

The problem with food waste

In total, Massachusetts throws away almost one million tons of food waste every year that could be reduced, composted, or recycled. In fact, food makes up over a quarter of all waste in the Bay State.

Nationally, commercial-scale waste comes in at about 16 billion tons every year. The United States wastes more food than any other country in the world, about 30-40% of our total food supply.

This has deadly consequences for the environment — fossil fuel emissions that are required for growing, processing, and trashing uneaten food in the United States each year are equivalent to the annual emissions of 42 coal-fired power plants, according to estimates from the Environmental Protection Agency.

Massachusetts aims to reduce solid waste disposal state-wide by 30% by 2030, and by 90% by 2050.

But some have pointed out that Massachusetts’s ban won’t work unless it’s enforced — according to a 2022 report from MassPIRG, 40% of the waste stream in the state is currently made up of banned materials.

Solutions

While the new ban targets large-scale waste, institutions affected by it have options for disposing of uneaten food.

Massachusetts has compiled a list of statewide off-site generators that accept food materials for composting, anaerobic digestion, and other processing.

The state pours funds into large-scale composting initiatives, and has cleared available capacity for food materials to be recycled into organic matter in the last several years.

Anaerobic digestion, a way of turning emissions into energy, is another burgeoning climate solution. The digesting machines have been compared to a “giant cow stomach,” as it uses bacteria from manure to eat the food waste and create methane, which is then converted to electricity.

Businesses and institutions can also get rid of unspoiled food while fighting food insecurity by donating to a local food bank.

Will you be impacted by the food waste changes in Mass.? Here’s what to know.