Over the first six months of the food and trash recycling at Denver International Airport, more than two-thirds of the waste generated at 19 participating concessionaires was diverted from landfills.
The efforts at DIA kept 69.2 tons of food and other recyclable waste out of landfills, DIA officials announced. A waste diversion rate of 71% among those concessionaires was three times higher than the overall airport-wide diversion rate, airport officials said, and four times Colorado’s 16% statewide rate of diverting waste from landfills.
DIA officials launched the Zero Waste Valet program in June – a pilot project run by the Colorado-based company Scraps, which specializes in reducing waste sent to landfills.
It started in DIA’s Concourse B, which contains the most passenger traffic.
“We are making significant and meaningful strides toward reducing landfilled waste and carbon emissions while demonstrating our commitment to becoming the greenest airport in the world,” airport chief executive Phil Washington said.
A $495,000 grant from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment helped launch the project.
A team of recyclers oversees food waste collection for composting and recycling, managing signs and coordinating the separation of waste from kitchens for composting, mixed recycling, and trash. While some concessionaires already recycled cardboard, the program expanded recycling to include glass, mixed waste, and food waste for composting.
Starting next spring, the recycling will expand to all food concessions in Concourse B, and officials say they’re planning eventually to start the service at food stores in DIA’s other two concourses.
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