kitchen sink garbage disposal .....

[Tomorrow]

Hum... no. Most cities in the civilized world gives you a bin for biological waste and they will do the composting themselves

I don't live in a city, I'm in a rural area. The trash utility doesn't even have paper/glass/plastic recycling, let alone noodles and egg shells. They're not going to pick up stuff for composting separately from the trash.

Wow, you do live in a backwards place. You can't even figure this simple concept out. I guess you also think recycling needs to be done in your backyard where you will turn used paper into blank sheets of paper by chewing on the old paper to turn it into paste and roll it using a rolling pin ?

Burn your leaves/grass much ?

Don't be a jerk. You mentioned that I should use a city utility that doesn't exist, and when I point out the only alternative you slam me for it. Real nice.

 

[wpotere]

Where I live you can put meat and bones in there too

Our waste is taken here to be converted into compost.

That is cool! I guess it does vary from place to place.

Hum... no. Most cities in the civilized world gives you a bin for biological waste and they will do the composting themselves and sell it to farms that need the compost (or firms that will make residential compost for people with home gardens/flower beds).

Wow, you do live in a backwards place. You can't even figure this simple concept out. I guess you also think recycling needs to be done in your backyard where you will turn used paper into blank sheets of paper by chewing on the old paper to turn it into paste and roll it using a rolling pin ?

Burn your leaves/grass much ?

Don't be that hard on him. Sadly the US is way behind the curve when it comes to recycling. We finally got a small recycle container here in Maryland where I live and people still use it as a trash bin. The problem is that they are either lazy (it is closer to them than the trash) or fail to read what the container is for/ don't care. I wish the US would get more proactive on things like this.

 

[snberk103]

...
I don't know how things are in your part of the world, but here we don't have recycling facilities for cookie crumbs, egg shells, or small bits of pasta. So we rinse our plates into the sink and let the disposal take care of it.

You don't have composting ?

Gee, what remote and backward part of the world do you live in ? Composting has been around for literally ages.

Be nice, KnightWRX... we don't all get to live in modern societies.

So you want me to throw this stuff into my backyard and let it rot there?

What do I do with it then? Let it...rot...even more? I don't have any use for it, I don't want to smell it, and I'd rather not have the vermin it attracts
.....
Okay, so I set it out against the back fence, which is all of 30' or so from the house. Then not only do I get to smell it, but several of my neighbors do, too. The raccoons, opossums, armadillos, skunks, etc. that it attracts would be everywhere. And at the end of it all, I don't even have a use for it. No thank you.

If you have a yard that big, you have tons of room for a compost bin. Homemade, store bought, whatever. They don't smell, they can be made vermin proof. Even if you don't have a garden, one of your neighbours will be happy to take it off your hands. ps... meat and oils should not be composted in a simple backyard composter.

Hum... no. Most cities in the civilized world gives you a bin for biological waste and they will do the composting themselves and sell it to farms that need the compost (or firms that will make residential compost for people with home gardens/flower beds).

Wow, you do live in a backwards place. You can't even figure this simple concept out. I guess you also think recycling needs to be done in your backyard where you will turn used paper into blank sheets of paper by chewing on the old paper to turn it into paste and roll it using a rolling pin ?

Burn your leaves/grass much ?

Be nice, KnightWRX.... see above comment

But, yeah ... most anywhere I've lived has had bio-binning. Though not here, as we are out in a rural area now. But now we do our own composting.

Hum... no. Most cities in the civilized world ....

umm I think you are thinking of CA. Most cities in the US do not do that. We have recycling bins and trash cans and that is it.

Um, there other cities in the civilized world that are neither in California, nor even the USA....

Look up, waaayyyy up.... [cue flute music]

I don't live in a city, I'm in a rural area. The trash utility doesn't even have paper/glass/plastic recycling, let alone noodles and egg shells. They're not going to pick up stuff for composting separately from the trash.

I live in a rural area too. We have to drive it to the depot when we have enough, but we have a fantastic recycling centre. KnightWRX is being a bit, um, smug.... but he is correct to a point. Recycling and composting have been the norm where we have lived (several locations) for quite a long time now. Not having it seems so, yesterday. Utilities can save you taxes by composting and recycling as well. It is getting more and more expensive to landfill trash. Compost is sold to either farmers, or to backyard gardeners. If the utility can't find a buyer or it's recycling, then it can at least pay much less to have it trucked away since it's already been sorted, and because there is no hazardous waste involved.

Unsorted trash, that may have hazardous waste must be treated as if it's all hazardous. Sorting the recycled stuff out (and bio stuff, if possible) means there is much much less volume to treat as potentially hazardous. And if your garbage utility is not treating unsorted household waste as potentially hazardous, then perhaps KnightWRX isn't so far off ... ????

Essentially, by flushing everything down the drain people are counting on expensive, taxpayer supported, infrastructure to take care of garbage that they can often deal with themselves. Plus, the cost of providing the water to do the flushing with, if the sink is hooked up to a utility connection. It boggles the mind when you consider that people think it's a good thing to pay taxes to collect the water, store the water, move the water, clean and sanitize the water, move the water to their house, just so that they can use it to wash garbage down the sink and into another large multimillion dollar plant to take that garbage back out of the water.

Sigh. I've been living on the West Coast for a long time. My aura nearly quivers when I think about this. Time for some herbal tea.....

 

[rdowns]

Many of the posts here belong in a friggin' garbage disposal.

 

[snberk103]

Many of the posts here belong in a friggin' garbage disposal.

I find most posts in many threads fit that bill. But then that's the modern social network at work for you..... ok, maybe it should be "social network not at work for you" ...

 

[Surely]

Hum... no. Most cities in the civilized world gives you a bin for biological waste and they will do the composting themselves and sell it to farms that need the compost (or firms that will make residential compost for people with home gardens/flower beds).

Wow, you do live in a backwards place. You can't even figure this simple concept out. I guess you also think recycling needs to be done in your backyard where you will turn used paper into blank sheets of paper by chewing on the old paper to turn it into paste and roll it using a rolling pin ?

Burn your leaves/grass much ?

I live in Los Angeles and there isn't a city organized compost program that I know of. I'm pretty sure LA is in the civilized world.

Pretty rude post, guy.

And I love my Insinkerator.

 

[skunk]

I live in Los Angeles and there isn't a city organized compost program that I know of. I'm pretty sure LA is in the civilized world.

Apparently not.

 

[-aggie-]

I live in Los Angeles and there isn't a city organized compost program that I know of. I'm pretty sure LA is in the civilized world.

Pretty rude post, guy.

And I love my Insinkerator.

That pretty well sums up most of his posts.

Being from the same part of the world as Tomorrow, the thought of composting makes me want to throw up. Luckily we don't have that or I know my tree hugging wife would insist on us doing it.

 

[MacNut]

Hum... no. Most cities in the civilized world gives you a bin for biological waste

What are you throwing out that you need a hazmat bin?

 

[Surely]

Apparently not.

Depends if you're involved with Hollywood or not.

That pretty well sums up most of his posts.

Oh, I've noticed.

 

[snberk103]

I live in Los Angeles and there isn't a city organized compost program that I know of. I'm pretty sure LA is in the civilized world.

Pretty rude post, guy.

And I love my Insinkerator.

Certainly he was blunt. But he has point. My mother-in-law lived in a small city (120k) in Canada that instituted a bio-bin program a decade or more ago. The city provided every household with a bin, and special biodegradable bags. All food waste would go into the bin. Bones, grounds, oils, spoiled meat, melted icecream, etc etc would go into the bin. If you could eat it, or if you used a paper towel to clean up something you could eat, you put it into the bin, and put the bin out with your regular garbage.

The result was that regular garbage pickup dropped from twice a week to once every 2 weeks. And even then, most people only needed once every month, or even once in every two months. The Bio Bins and the Blue Box recycling were then picked up once a week.

The city sold the compost.
The city delayed the expansion of the clean water plant for 10 years (partly because of the savings of the water to run the waste disposals). And delayed the expansion of the sewage plant indefinitely.

When the landfill reached capacity (why the bio bin program was started) they were really only dealing with hazardous waste at this point - and what little non-compostable and recyclable waste was left over - and were able to dispose of it contracting to have shipped to, iirc, Michigan. Don't know what Michigan did with it.

 

[rhett7660]

I wish they had bio bins in my neck of the woods. We just received our blue recycling bins last year. I think those are great!! We do have to seperate our grass clippings etc. Heck what is one more plastic bin, especially if it saves the landfills and delays them from filling up that much sooner!

 

[QuarterSwede]

Don't be a jerk. You mentioned that I should use a city utility that doesn't exist, and when I point out the only alternative you slam me for it. Real nice.

KnightWRX is a know it all stuck up Canadian. You get used to it ... or block him

Sadly the US is way behind the curve when it comes to recycling. We finally got a small recycle container here in Maryland where I live and people still use it as a trash bin. The problem is that they are either lazy (it is closer to them than the trash) or fail to read what the container is for/ don't care. I wish the US would get more proactive on things like this.

The problem with the US and recycling is that most trash companies charge extra to pick it up.

Also, just because some urban people don't think composting sounds attractive doesn't mean there aren't a lot of people in the US that do compost. Heck, even Costco sells a composting bin during the spring.

To the OP, I put coffee grounds down my Insinkerator (love it) daily and it has no issues with it.

A few things to know though:

• Never run it with the water off!
• Not all disposals are created equal. Insinkerator is, by far, the most reliable and best brand. I had another brand a while ago and it clogged constantly on most normal items (crappy cheap apartment disposal).
• DO NOT put a lot of stringy, slimy or starchy veggies down it or it will clog (celery, cucumber and potato skins). Do a few at a time, let it clear then do more and you'll be fine.
• Those disposal cleaners are a rip off. Use a few pieces of ice a few times with it running and it'll clean it out good as new. Don't use a ton of ice at once or you'll end up with a slushy.
• If it does get clogged using a plunger to clear it can burst a pipe. I've never had an issue doing this but I've heard it can.
• Don't let food sit in it or it'll start stinking. To get rid of any smell run it with some scented liquid dish soap, lemon juice or, best, throw orange rinds in it.

 

[KnightWRX]

KnightWRX is a know it all stuck up Canadian.

I don't know it all, but I know the US is quite retarded as far as environmental friendliness goes.

You might think LA is the civilized world because it has a few concrete buildings, but seriously, suggesting "composting" needs to happen "in your own backyard" shows how backwards thinking some of the folks around your parts are. Recycling and trash disposable are not things you do in your backyard, why would you think composting would require to be there ?

And why don't your communities/municipalities offer these services ? Seriously, the US needs to join the rest of the world. Throwing out biological waste stuff into the kitchen sink... How 1950s.

And I hate hippy stuff, I'm the first to tell them to go hug a tree or to tell my GF that I'm now washing the trash just to "recycle" it.

Call me stuck up all you want, it doesn't change the fact that Tomorrow displayed gross ignorance in his posts in this thread.

 

[Tomorrow]

Call me stuck up all you want, it doesn't change the fact that Tomorrow displayed gross ignorance in his posts in this thread.

You're still not getting it, are you?

If such a service does not exist - and it doesn't exist here - then we're left to do it ourselves.

The local trash utility (not city owned; again, I'm not in city limits) does not have any sort of recycling options for us at all. None. Not even newspapers, glass bottles, etc.

For that matter, there's no service at all where you can either (1) have your compost materials picked up, or (2) drop off your compost materials. That would be "littering," and it's against the law.

You can call me ignorant all you want. I'll call you just plain wrong.

P.S. - Don't be a jerk.

 

[rdowns]

Most cities in the civilized world gives you a bin for biological waste

Wait, so putting it in a sock isn't safe?

 

[Surely]

 

[KnightWRX]

You're still not getting it, are you?

If such a service does not exist - and it doesn't exist here - then we're left to do it ourselves.

So, again, you do not live in the civilized portion of the world. I live in a rural community of about 3000 souls. We have recycling, composting, trash pick-up, running water and electricity. We also have Internet of all things. Our roads are also paved and there's Subway restaurant on the corner of main street.

The US is behind the times.

 

[Tomorrow]

So, again, you do not live in the civilized portion of the world. I live in a rural community of about 3000 souls.

I live in a rural community of about 600, on the outskirts of a city of over a million. We're plenty civilized here, whether we have folks come and collect our uneaten scraps or not.

If you're trying to get me (or anyone else) to bow down to how "civilized" your rural community is versus my own, you're going to be waiting a while.

P.S. - there you go again.

 

[dukebound85]

So, again, you do not live in the civilized portion of the world. I live in a rural community of about 3000 souls. We have recycling, composting, trash pick-up, running water and electricity. We also have Internet of all things. Our roads are also paved and there's Subway restaurant on the corner of main street.

The US is behind the times.

I have read this thread and honestly, I am quite appalled by your general rudeness displayed in your posts.

Do you know how many small towns there are in the US (with populations much less than 3000)? While all have trash services, not all will have recycle or "bio" services. There is a simple reason for this, that being there is not enough population/funding to justify the cost for those services.

Yet you like to claim it is because these towns are not civilized

 

[wpotere]

KnightWRX is a know it all stuck up Canadian. You get used to it ... or block him


The problem with the US and recycling is that most trash companies charge extra to pick it up.

Also, just because some urban people don't think composting sounds attractive doesn't mean there aren't a lot of people in the US that do compost. Heck, even Costco sells a composting bin during the spring.

[/LIST]

Do you? I do when I can and yes, I do know there is an extra charge but if done right there can be returns as well (like free compost). I try to do what I can right now, but I live in an apartment complex and I am at the mercy of my landlords. We should be more proactive in this country but all we care about is what is easiest (stuff it all in one can and throw it out the door). I was never a greenie until I lived in Germany and I found how easy it can be.

 

[rdowns]

I have read this thread and honestly, I am quite appalled by your general rudeness displayed in your posts.

That seems to be his MO in all threads.

 

[rhett7660]

That seems to be his MO in all threads.

I think this can be said for quite a few members on this board.

 

[Surely]

Ah, Quebec. Not behind the times at all.

Better, but may not work in Canada: http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-may-12-2011/ored-to-death

 

[snberk103]

KnightWRX can be smug, blunt, and occasionally rude... but that doesn't make his point necessarily wrong.

The USA, generally, is behind the rest of the modern world in this regard. There may be reasons for it, but that's just the way it is.

Size of the community doesn't matter. I don't know every small community in Canada, but of the several I know well they each have community volunteer organized blue box recycling (plastics, glass, paper, etc) and one has a community organized kitchen waste composting facility. People bring what they have, and take what they need.

If you have a back yard fence 30' away, you have room to compost vegetable matter from the kitchen. Even if all you do is spread it out on the lawn, you are diverting waste from somewhere it doesn't need to go.

If you are in a small community, without a municipal trash service, then chances are you are paying by the bin or kilo to a private operator (that's what we do, at least). Why would you not divert as much waste as possible by composting it?

These things take a commitment from the community. Either to go through the transition as the municipality changes over, or to participate in the volunteer run organization. It's actually amazing simple, once you get into the habit. In my community (of several thousands) we don't have a utility to pick up trash, just a private operator. You can pay them to pick up from your driveway, or you can run the bins down to them. We choose the latter option. You can do some recycling there, or you can run your recyclables to the recycle depot.

You can sort your recyclables there, or you can sort 'em at home (we prefer the latter option) It's a chance to stop and chat at the depot (open 6 days a week). The recycle depot is entirely volunteer run, owned, and managed, plus they have the additional cost challenge of having to move the stuff off of an island.

Kitchen composting is mostly down at home. Restaurant frying oil is picked up by a couple of people who turn it into bio-diesel. The restaurant saves money by not having to pay to dispose of it, the greenies make some money selling it to old-hippies who use it to fuel their cars.

All of this is community based. All because we, as a community, feel that we can do more to more environmentally sound. We can do it at several thousand souls, and there are much smaller communities (in the hundred or so souls) nearby that much the same.

Its a commitment thing, not a size thing.

Plus... it saves taxes. That's the bit that perplexes me. As an outsider looking in, I see great outbursts of passionate rhetoric in the USA about the need to lower taxes. But then you seem to flush all of your kitchen waste into multimillion dollar facilities that need to clean up the water again to make it drinkable.... so wasteful on two fronts. And you pay a utility to dispose of materials that could otherwise be used again. Burying them or burning them only means that you have to deal with downwind or downstream costs as well....

So, KnigthWRX may be a smug, rude, and blunt (are you from Quebec, Knight? ) but he is not entirely wrong. The USA is behind the times in this area. So don't shoot the messenger.