Food Waste Diversion Is a Billion-Dollar Moneymaker

Food waste is understood to be an environmental issue, but it is also a missed economic opportunity—one that could be supporting local communities. Food waste makes up 24 percent of municipal solid waste in landfills, where it creates the potent climate pollutant methane as it decomposes. Beyond the environmental impacts, food sent to landfills means lost resources, inflated disposal costs, and an untapped opportunity for states and local governments to create new jobs and economic activity.  

Food waste diversion policies can help realize that missed opportunity. These policies can benefit local economic development—on the order of more than $3 billion in a state like Illinois—by building infrastructure to process food scraps into a soil amendment that can aid resiliency, recover from wildfire, mitigate storm damage, sequester carbon, inhibit windstorms, and renew farmland to grow more nutritious food instead of filling up noxious landfills and incinerators.  

Eleven states already have food waste diversion laws that prevent food from being disposed of in landfills or incinerators, which have resulted in substantial growth of food rescue organizations as well as organic waste hauling and processing businesses. These state-level laws also present an opportunity for local jurisdictions to offer additional food scrap recycling services to their residents, potentially at little to no additional cost to the jurisdictions or their residents if done thoughtfully.  

To better understand these opportunities, NRDC commissioned research that estimates the economic benefits of food waste diversion policies: state-level food waste diversion policy scenarios in Colorado and Illinois that compare the benefits, including various sectors and exemptions; and the associated costs to jurisdictions of rolling out food scrap recycling programs.  

What we found 

• Long-term savings: Food is the most common item in America’s landfills, but by keeping food out of landfills, we can save money by extending the lifespan of the landfill, helping to avoid the need for costly landfill expansion or development of new landfill facilities. 
• Jobs: A comprehensive policy could result in $3.8 billion in cumulative economic activity and create 14,000 jobs across Illinois. In Colorado, a policy could create $2.4 billion in economic activity and more than 9,000 jobs upon full implementation. These gains would largely occur in the waste hauling sector, followed by composting and organic waste processing and food rescue.  
• Broad participation: States with food waste diversion policies create long-term economic incentives for diverting food waste by removing disposal—often the cheapest option—from the table. Statewide policies drive investment into composting infrastructure, provide stability for burgeoning composters by securing food waste as a feedstock, and lower costs related to processing and hauling through economies of scale.  
• Residents: Households account for more than one-third of food waste generated in the United States, and the most impactful food waste diversion policies include residential food waste diversion in addition to commercial sectors. Though ensuring compliance with a food waste diversion policy for all households in a state is a big and expensive undertaking, especially for local governments, the benefits of minimizing added costs, streamlining education, and emphasizing waste reduction can be maximized by integrating food scrap collection with efficient household waste and recycling collection programs.  
• System efficiencies: Communities that evaluate and update their entire solid waste program while launching a food waste program can offset many program expenses and produce significant savings. By reducing trash collection frequency, improving route density, and renegotiating contract terms, a community can partially or fully offset the cost of adding weekly organics recycling collection. 
• Education: Communities with lower costs per household and higher participation incorporate sustained public education as a core component of their programs. 

The research is clear: Increased food waste diversion is an incredible, largely untapped economic opportunity for states and local governments. By implementing comprehensive food waste diversion policies, states can create thousands of new jobs, generate billions in economic activity, create market conditions to develop cost-effective programs, make more food available locally, and reduce climate pollution. When thoughtfully designed, these programs can be implemented with little or no net increase in overall waste service costs while also reducing long-term waste management costs and extending the life of landfills. Keeping food waste out of landfills can be a significant economic driver, creating a net positive for a more circular food system.

This NRDC.org blog is available for online republication by news media outlets or nonprofits under these conditions: The writer(s) must be credited with a byline; you must note prominently that the blog was originally published by NRDC.org and link to the original; the blog cannot be edited (beyond simple things such as grammar); you can’t resell the blog in any form or grant republishing rights to other outlets; you can’t republish our material wholesale or automatically—you need to select blogs individually; you can’t republish the photos or graphics on our site without specific permission; you should drop us a note to let us know when you’ve used one of our blogs.