Xiaoguo (Ivy) Geng

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With people getting increasingly familiar with the concept of climate change adaptation, composting has become a popular way to show people’s actions on protecting the earth. In 2018, the EPA estimated that 2.6 million tons of food (4.1% of food waste) was made into compost. However, there are two different kinds of composting: sending waste to a composting company (offsite composting) or composting at the place where waste creates (onsite composting). The author conducted a case study at a high school in Pennsylvania, US., designed the Bokashi composting experiment and compared the economic cost and carbon emission for the onsite composting and offsite composting at the school. The study finds that the cost of 1 kg of food waste under 100 times used for onsite composting is $ 0.29 and that for offsite composting is $0.22 (24% reduction). However, in this case, the onsite composting causes 0.014 kgCO2e per kg of food waste, while the offsite composting generates 0.035 kgCO2e per kg. Switching from offsite to onsite composing would then result in a reduction of 21kgCO2e per kg. Therefore, onsite composting costs are higher but have more environmental benefits than offsite composting.