Compost (Green Can) Service
 For food scraps & yard waste
Collected weekly
Place your can at the curb by 5:00 a.m. on your designated pickup day
Food scraps and food-soiled paper make up about 23% of Marin's residential waste stream. Now your organic waste will be diverted from the landfill to create a rich and nutritious soil amendment that can be put back in the earth, closing the "recycling loop."
Attention Almonte Residents: The Almonte Sanitary District Board decided not to adopt the new, weekly food composting service. Almonte green cans will continue to be picked up every other week. Please use it for yard waste only because it is against health codes to put rotting food into a can that is not dumped on a weekly basis. Click here to view the calendar and find the week of pick up service in your area.
What happens with your compost?
1. You will collect your food scraps and food-soiled paper items in kitchen pails, bowls or bins and then transfer the food scraps to your compost can along with your yard waste.
2. We empty your compost can once a week and transport your organics to The Redwood Landfill and Recycling Center.
3. Food scraps, food-soiled paper and yard waste are processed into premium, affordable compost.
4. Gardeners and farmers apply compost to soil to improve moisture retention and nutrient value of soil.
5. Plants grow... and the cycle continues.
Why Compost?
- It's a step toward Marin County's goal of diverting 80% of our waste stream away from the landfill. Learn more about Marin's Zero Waste goals here.
- It preserves the life of Marin's only landfill by diverting a major component of our waste stream.
- Helps reduce the production of methane gas in the landfill, which contributes to global warming. (Methane is created when food rots in the airless environment of a landfill. It is not created in a compost operation because of the presence of oxygen.)
- More items (such as meat, bones and soiled paper) can be composted in this program than in an individuals typical backyard compost pile.
- Food composting saves water by eliminating the need to use household garbage disposals.
- If you fully participate in food composting and recycling, you may be able to reduce the size of the trash can you require, saving you money.
- It may eventually lead to health code changes that would make it possible to pick up garbage less frequently reducing the carbon footprint of hauling trucks
Participate, Reduce and Save
 Did you know that MVRS offers a less expensive 20-gallon can rate for customers who participate so much in recycling and composting that they do not fill larger-size cans with trash? That's your incentive to participate fully in the services that help you divert waste away from the landfill.
Don't miss out! Reduce, reuse, recycle and compost as much as you can to see if you can drop a can size and save money.
No More Plastic Bags
Now that food scraps and yard waste are being composted together, we can no longer pick up yard waste in plastic bags. If you have extra yard waste you want taken away and composted, it must be placed in cans that we are able to dump out OR large paper bags designed for yard waste that are available in many stores. Yard waste in plastic bags will have to be dumped as garbage at a charge of $8.00 per 32-gallon bag (yard waste in paper bags is just $6.00 per bag).
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