Composting is a simple action you can take to reduce greenhouse gasses, support climate action, and reduce your carbon footprint.
Free Kitchen Composting Pail
The city is jumping into a composting eco-initiative by offering a limited number of free kitchen composting pails as an incentive to compost at home.
The city will provide 500 Behrens 1.5-gallon composting pails on a first come, first serve basis to the community. However, there is one requirement to garner your pail, you have to have or plan to sign up for composting service from the city’s partner – Cowgirl Compost CO..
Pails can be picked up in the foyer of Centennial Hall at 124 10th Street from 7:30am to 5:30pm Monday - Thursday and 7:30am to 11:30am Friday.
Did You Know?
The City of Steamboat Springs has a goal to divert 85% of our waste stream through composting and recycling by 2050, with an interim goal of 46% by 2030. Approximately 30% of the current waste is from food – so composting will be key to meeting that goal.
Benefits of Composting
Is a way for individuals to support climate action and reduce greenhouse gases and methane emissions from landfills.
Provides insight and awareness of the foods you might be wasting, which can lead to reduced food costs for you and your family.
Application of compost enriches soil, helps retain moisture, particularly beneficial in our arid climate, and reduces the need for chemical fertilizers.
Compost added to soil helps to reduce soil erosion by binding soil together, increasing infiltration, and slowing the surface flow of water.
Get Started Composting Organics
Learn about how you can join in the effort to composts organics. The following commercial composter serve Steamboat Springs.
This Food Waste for Livestock Feed Feasibility Study was conducted by the Community Agriculture Alliance (CAA) on behalf of the City of Steamboat Springs. Its purpose was to assess the viability of diverting food waste from landfill disposal to animal feed for livestock operations throughout Routt County region.
The study also supports Routt County’s Climate Action Plan (CAP), which calls for significant landfill diversion by 2050 through multiple mechanisms including organics recovery.
Organics Recovery Study
This Organics Recovery Study is intended to provide the City of Steamboat Springs (City) and Routt County (County) with information, assessments, and recommendations to move organics recovery from a low-priority, voluntary and limited activity to a core component of their overall municipal solid waste stream (MSW) management system. This work was undertaken in the context of the Routt County Climate Action Plan (CAP) 2050 goals of 85% landfill diversion and 69% greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction from the waste sector and its priority of expanding community-wide composting collection and infrastructure.