• Composting reduces waste and creates natural fertilizerErdbeerpflanze image by lamaka from Fotolia.com
  
  Composting food and household waste is a simple and rewarding way to go green. Composting helps to reduce the amount of waste in landfills and offers a natural source of fertilizer. Composting projects can be as simple as depositing your kitchen scraps in a composting bin and using the compost to fertilize your garden or more complex, such as a large-scale government-sponsored project that transforms municipal waste into compost soil. Several agencies offer food and waste composting grants.
  
  

Bin Grants

• The Lombard, Illinois, Public Works Department offers a compost bin grant program for village residents. All Lombard home owners are eligible to apply. Residents purchase their own compost bin and then submit a grant application to the Lombard Public Works Department. Applications must include a store receipt and a photo of the installed composting bin. The department reimburses the purchase up to $80.
  
  Lombard Public Works Department
  
  255 E. Wilson Avenue
  
  Lombard, IL 60148
  
  630-620-5700
  
  villageoflombard.org
  
  

Coordinated Prevention Grants

• The State of Washington’s Department of Ecology offers Coordinated Prevention Grants. The grants fund projects that work to decrease the impact of solid waste on the environment. Local government agencies within Washington are eligible to apply under the “Organics” category, which includes yard and food waste composting projects. Examples of successful grant applications include a yard debris diversion program in which a grant recipient purchased composting bins and sold them at a reduced rate to citizens. Each bin included a “how-to” guide to composting and participation at two yearly composting workshops.
  
  State of Washington
  
  Department of Ecology
  
  P.O. Box 47600
  
  Olympia, WA 9850
  
  360-407-6223
  
  ecy.wa.gov
  
  

Recycling Equipment Grants

• The Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection’s recycling equipment grant program offers low-cost composting bins to cities and town government agencies. The bins are to be sold to community members at a subsidized price. Bins can be used to compost household food waste, such as kitchen scraps, and yard waste, such as lawn clippings. Two types of bins are available, the Earth Machine and the New Age Composter. Both styles are made from at least 50 percent recycled plastic, are rodent-resistant and use aerobic, or oxygen-utilizing, composting. According to the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection’s website, the composting bins can transform between 500 and 1,000 pounds of organic household waste into soil each year, which saves waste from going into landfills and creates healthy garden soil. Since the grant program’s inception in 1993, residents of participating municipalities have cut waste disposal by an average of 27 percent.
  
  Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection
  
  One Winter Street
  
  Boston, MA 02108
  
  617-292-5500
  
  mass.gov