This is where change begins.
Organics Collection in Apartments
The University at Buffalo is expanding its organics collection services across campus to help achieve climate neutrality and zero waste goals by 2030.
All students living in on-campus apartments will now have the ability to capture and divert organic waste from the trash in their living environments.
Acceptable Items
- Fruit and vegetables
- Meat and seafood
- Dairy
- Coffee grounds and filters
- Eggshells
- Pasta, rice, grains
- Tea, tea bags
- BPI-certified compostable products
Items Not Accepted
- Plastics
- Liquids
- Packaging/paper
- Produce stickers
- Bulk fats, oils
- Glass
- Gum
- Metal
- Styrofoam
FAQs
- Students can obtain more collection bags at your apartment complex's community center--where you pick up your mail!
- Collect all food scraps and organic waste material from your apartment kitchen. Place these items in your Bag to Earth organics collection bag. Once full, discard your collected organics in the orange organics tote at your trash corral (where you typically take your trash and recycling).
- You should keep each bag for a week. If you have filled it sooner, you should take your bag to the orange bin in the disposal corral and discard as usual. Pro tip: you can store your bag in the fridge or freezer if you don't generate a lot of food waste.
- Your organics will be sent to Natural Upcycling, and “fed” to an anaerobic digester, where your food scraps will be turned into energy and sludge that will then be composted right here in Buffalo at Buffalo River Compost.
- Yes! BPI-certified, compostable take-out containers are allowed in the orange organics bin.
- If you aren't sure if your container is compostable, please place it in the trash to help avoid contaminating the organics bin.
- UB collects organics in all dining facilities behind the scenes including kitchen scraps and cuttings and food that is not able to be recovered.
- In C3, Governors, and Main Street Dining Halls there is an organics collection stream that food waste is placed into.
- In One World Cafe there are organics collection bins at each ROT (Recycling, Organics, Trash) stations within the facility.
- UB’s robust Climate Action Plan is in place with a strategic plan to reduce the overall carbon footprint of the university.
- Please check out the Zero Waste Strategic Plan for more information!
Bin Locations
Organic collection totes are located at every trash corral within the on-campus apartment complexes. Place your organics in the orange tote!
A map of tote placements can be viewed here.