Collecting coffee grounds for compost: we need your help

capt. planet

Are you aware that every month the City of New York pays private carters millions of dollars to ship compostable food wastes to landfills in the Midwest, while we import compost from Long Island and Canada for our gardens?

I’ve created a proposed business that would collect these food wastes principally from small coffee shops, juice bars and restaurants and convert them to compost. This business would employ local youths to pedal bike carts to collect the wastes, then convert them to compost in small in-vessel composting machines located in manufacturing zones scattered throughout our communities. This type of business model exists successfully in other cities such as North Hampton Mass. and Phila. Penn. but has yet to take hold here in NYC.

It seems that the City wants more evidence of demand for composting services before they will create a carting license that makes sense for community carters such as the one I propose.

If we could get say 50 coffee houses to complete this survey, we might be able to convince the City that the demand exists.

Below is a link to an on-line survey I created that collects information about the demand for collection of coffee grounds that exists at local coffee houses.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/WV5YT8R

Please feel free to forward this email to your favorite coffee house and ask them to complete it the survey. When you do so, you might ask them what they’re doing now with their coffee grounds, day old baked goods, fruit pulp, food waste and other compostables. Suggest you might be more likely to patronize an establishment that composts their food wastes, rather than one that sends them to a landfill.

Also feel free to forward this email to your friends as well.

Let me know if you have any questions or would like to learn more about what I propose.

Let’s see if we collectively can put an end to this foolish waste of resources and City tax revenues.

Dawndew

How is this going?  More coffee houses keep opening here in North CH.

capt. planet

I'm now picking up from Tinto's coffee shop and Punchline juice bar both on Nostrand between Park Place and Sterling Place.  I'm getting about 8 gallons of organics every three days.  This is part of a test I'm conducting to see what volume is generated.  More consciousness raising is key, and its coming.  Please see the article from today's NY Times real estate section as an example.  

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/20/realestate/a-mission-to-separate-organic-waste-in-new-york-city-trash.html?module=Search&mabReward=relbias:r,{"2":"RI:14"}

Dawndew

As a huge coffee fan myself I wonder; What types of plants benefit most from coffee grounds?  My mother used them around her rose bushes specifically.

whynot_31

I have always wondered if plants that grow in soil enriched with coffee grounds tend be irritable if re-potted in soil without the grounds.

pragmaticguy

You have to wean them off the enriched grounds by using decaf.

tsarina

meme's healthy nibbles would be a great place to get their juicing leftovers.

capt. planet

I've been collecting juice pulp from Punchline, next to Memes and also coffee grounds from Tintos also nearby. I'm carting them on my bike cart to Imani Garden for the past six months.
You can find out more at:
www.green-phoenix.org