Since mid-March, when Sonoma County imposed a public health emergency stay-at-home order, residents have been filling their green, curbside bins with record amounts of compost: yard waste, mostly, with a mix of kitchen scraps. Staying home or close to it aligned perfectly with the spring explosion of greenery, said Fred Stemmler, general manager of Recology Sonoma Marin, the south Santa Rosa recycling center. The amounts of compost picked up by Recology’s trucks “exploded with it.” “You’re stuck in your house, you’re going stir crazy, now’s the time to weed, to garden,” Stemmler said.
The pandemic has brought the impulse to compost “to front of mind,” said Robert Reed, a spokesman for Recology in San Francisco. People are making more meals at home, with some of those meals featuring food they’ve grown themselves. Those new to composting must sometimes overcome what Reed calls “the ick factor” — the mistaken fear that collecting coffee grounds and banana peels in a pail in the kitchen might create an odor.