Waste and recycling collection is changing across the country as the cost of processing recycling increases and cities make commitments to reduce waste and climate emissions. With these changes, cities are re-evaluating waste and recycling collection systems.
The City has a contract with Sanitary Service Company (SSC) to manage residential waste collection in Bellingham. In February 2023, Bellingham City Council approved a resolution to allow the City to modify its contract with SSC to include these changes:
- Switch from a three-bin, curb-sorted recycling system for single-family residences to a single-stream recycling system that uses one 96-gallon bin for all recyclables.
- Add organic waste collection as a standard service for all single-family residential customers.
These changes support the City’s waste reduction and climate action goals and help Bellingham meet future statewide requirements. In 2024, SSC implemented single-stream recycling. Starting in February 2025, SSC will begin rolling out green bins with yellow lids for FoodPlus! organic waste management, one neighborhood at a time. All Bellingham residents living on lots with four units or less who do not already participate in FoodPlus! will begin receiving the service.
Visit SSC’s website for more information about waste and recycling collection services, rates and schedules.
Organic Waste Collection
Household organic waste includes food, food-soiled paper, yard waste and approved compostable packaging (find downloadable waste sorting guides). In the absence of an organic waste collection program, it is put in the same bin as garbage and taken to the landfill. According to recent municipal solid waste studies, organic waste makes up about 30% of Bellingham’s landfill waste.
With an organic waste collection program, Bellingham residents put their organic waste in a separate, 60-gallon green bin with a yellow lid through SSC’s FoodPlus! program. The organic waste is then taken to Green Earth Technology in Whatcom County where it is composted into a nutrient-rich soil amendment that helps plants grow.
Starting in early 2025, organic waste collection will be added as a standard service for all single-family residential customers in Bellingham. This means that all Bellingham residents living on lots with four units or less will receive this service if they do not already. For those new to the program, a monthly fee will be added to their garbage bills (~$13.69 per month). SSC picks up organic waste every other week. More than 40% of Bellingham SSC customers already voluntarily participate in the FoodPlus! program year-round and will not notice any change in their service.
Yes! There are ways to save money on your garbage bill to help offset the cost of the new FoodPlus! service.
Reducing garbage collection frequency or bin size
Many SSC customers who participate in the FoodPlus! service find that they are able to reduce their garbage collection frequency, since much of their waste can be diverted into their new FoodPlus! bin. Reducing garbage collection frequency can help offset the cost of the FoodPlus! service. Find examples of what these cost savings could look like in different collection scenarios below (please note that taxes are not included in the calculations).
Are you a super recycler or composter that produces very little garbage waste? If so, you may be able to qualify for a 30-gallon garbage bin that is picked up once per month and costs less than the standard 60-gallon bin.
Please contact SSC to discuss changes to collection frequency or bin size.
Discounts for low-income seniors and those with permanent disabilities
SSC offers a discounted rate for residential customers in Bellingham who:
- Are 62 years of age or older and meet low-income requirements; OR
- Are 18 years of age or older, meet low-income requirements, and receive permanent Social Security Disability payments
The City also offers a discounted rate on water, sewer, and stormwater utilities provided by the City of Bellingham if you meet one of the above criteria. Please contact the Bellingham Finance Department at (360) 778-8010 to see if you qualify for the discounted rates on your utility or garbage bills.
Combining waste collection services if you live on a lot with multiple units
Do you live on a lot with two, three, or four units (either in the same building or separated)? If so, you may be able to combine waste collection services with your neighbors who live on the same lot as you. By doing this, you can reduce the number of bins on your lot while also reducing costs by splitting the bill with your neighbors. Learn more under the “Other” section below.
Organic waste collection reduces the amount of organic material that ends up in landfills that could otherwise be composted into a beneficial product. Organic waste collection results in fewer garbage pick-ups each month and reduces climate emissions.
Learn more about the benefits of organic waste collection:
- Reduced climate emissions
- Organic material that is sent to the landfill emits methane as it decomposes over time. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas that traps carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, contributing to climate change. According to the US EPA, 15% of methane emissions in the US are from landfills. Diverting organic waste from the landfill reduces methane emissions associated with waste disposal.
- Turn waste into compost
- Organic material can be composted and turned into a nutrient-rich soil amendment that helps plants grow, rather than rotting away in a landfill. This compost can then be used to improve soil quality, giving the waste a beneficial purpose. Bellingham’s organic waste is brought to Green Earth Technology in Lynden to be composted locally.
- Fewer garbage pickups
- A waste audit in 2018 found that 30% of Bellingham’s residential waste in landfills was organic material. When customers divert organic waste from their garbage into a separate bin, they can reduce the frequency of their garbage bin pick-ups.
- Closing the loop with single-use plastics
- Adding organic waste collection for all single-family residential customers also helps to close the loop on our single-use plastics ban. Now when people take home compostable takeout containers, they can compost these at home.
Food, food-soiled paper, yard waste, and approved compostable materials. Look for products labelled commercially compostable. We’ve worked with SSC and Sustainable Connections to develop downloadable residential waste sorting guides.
Pet waste – even if it’s in a bag labeled “compostable” or “biodegradable” – belongs in the trash.
Washington state legislators passed two recent Organics Managment Laws that set goals to divert 75% of organic material from landfills over the coming years. These laws set the following requirements:
- By April 1, 2027, governments and other entities must make year-round organic waste collection services available to all single-family residential customers
- By April 1, 2030, all single-family customers in these cities must receive organics and food waste collection service.
By requiring organic waste collection starting in 2025, Bellingham is getting a head start on meeting these statewide requirements.
We do not currently have exemptions available for SSC customers who compost at home. The Department of Ecology will be issuing guidelines for a waiver process in 2026 at which time the City will consider the best approach for adopting those guidelines.
If you compost at home, there are items that you can put in your FoodPlus! bin to be commercially composted that you might not add to your home compost pile, such as meat and fish scraps (including bones), dairy products, bread and other baked goods, rice and pasta, citrus peels, approved compostable packaging, and more.
Even if you don’t generate a significant amount of food or yard waste, every bit of organic waste that you can divert from your garbage into your FoodPlus! bin makes a difference. This organic waste can be converted into a nutrient-rich compost product rather than rotting in a landfill.
SSC may offer opportunities in the future for using your own smaller bin.
Do you live on a lot with two, three, or four units (either in the same building or separated)? If so, you may be able to combine waste collection services with your neighbors who live on the same lot as you. By doing this, you can reduce the number of bins on your lot while also reducing costs by splitting the bill with your neighbors. Learn more under the “Other” section below.
If you are concerned about keeping your FoodPlus! bin clean, you have options. Bagging your compost can help reduce mess or pests. While bags are not required, if you choose to use them, please ensure they are certified compostable. Alternatively, you can use paper bags or line your indoor compost bin with newspaper. View this flyer (click here for a Spanish version) to learn more about which bags to use.
SSC provides a bin cleaning service for a fee. Through this service, SSC will pick up your current bin and replace it with a fresh one. Contact SSC for current pricing and to schedule a bin swap.
Additionally, some customers choose to occasionally clean their bins themselves.
Studies have found that food waste costs the average family $1,500 per year. You can save money and reduce food waste by making small changes to your cooking and shopping habits. Learn how to use food well.
Please only send water down your kitchen sink drain whenever possible. Food scraps sent down your drain can build up in your sewer pipes and cause costly clogs. Not only that, but this food can cause problems for our wastewater treatment plant too. Learn more.
Other
Single-Stream Recycling
Single-stream recycling is a collection system in which all recyclables are placed in a single bin for recycling. Under this system, residents place plastic, aluminum, paper, cardboard, newspaper, etc. in one bin. The bins are picked up by local waste collection service providers and sent to a Materials Recovery Facility (MRF). MRFs are equipped with advanced technology to properly sort and separate recycling so that the recyclables can be sold and manufactured into new products.
Single-stream (or “commingled”) recycling is the most common recycling method in Washington State and most of the nation. According to Zero Waste Washington’s 2019 State of Residential Recycling and Organics Collection in Washington report, more than 85% of Washington cities already use single stream, or commingled, recycling systems. The MRF that Bellingham sends its recycling to already receives mixed recycling from other cities.
The benefits of single-stream recycling include reduced operational costs and increased participation in recycling due to customer convenience. Many of the benefits of single-stream recycling below were demonstrated during a 2022 pilot project in Bellingham’s Edgemoor neighborhood or in other cities that use single-stream recycling:
- Reduced operational costs
- Single-stream recycling allows for recycling bin pick-up to be automated, leading to more efficient collection, fewer recycling trucks needed, and reduced labor costs. Reducing operational costs can provide more cost predictability and fewer customer rate increases.
- Improved worker and community safety
- Automation of recycling collection services reduces employee injuries and exposure to hazards. Fewer sanitation trucks on the road result in less traffic congestion and reduced risk of accidents.
- Reduced climate emissions
- Fewer sanitation trucks on the roads also reduces transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions. The use of more efficient and spacious trucks reduce the number of round-trip drop-offs the trucks need to make.
- Less litter and contamination
- Using a fully enclosed bin instead of open crates for recycling limits how much recyclables are exposed to weather conditions.
- Wind blows recyclables into yards, roadways, ditches, and waterways which can affect drainage, traffic, and critical water areas. This creates litter that local governments must expend taxpayer resources to clean.
- Rainwater can contaminate recyclables, especially paper products and cardboard. It is more difficult to properly sort and recycle wet cardboard.
- Using a fully enclosed bin instead of open crates for recycling limits how much recyclables are exposed to weather conditions.
- Customer convenience
- Mixed recycling – customers do not need to separate their recyclables.
- More space – the bin holds more material, allowing for fewer pick-ups.
- Wheels – the bins can be wheeled to the curb instead of needing to be carried.
- Enclosed – a lid on the bin means fewer recyclables are blown away or rained on.
Bottles, cans, jugs, tubs, paper and cardboard. We’ve worked with SSC and Sustainable Connections to develop downloadable residential waste sorting guides.
In an open 3-bin system, recyclables are exposed to weather conditions. Several months of the year, the recyclables that were once sorted appropriately and awaiting collection are caught in the wind and scattered into yards, roadways, ditches, and waterways. These wind-blown items can affect drainage, traffic, and critical water areas designed for improving water quality. Local government staff maintaining this infrastructure are then responsible to pick up wind-blown objects, expending time and taxpayer resources to do so. Using a fully enclosed single bin reduces the potential of wind-blown materials ending up as litter.
Additionally, rainwater can be a contaminant to the recyclables, especially paper products and cardboard. It is more difficult to properly sort and recycle cardboard that has been contaminated by rain. A fully enclosed bin reduces the amount of rainwater that could contaminate the recyclables.
Reducing operational costs by using more efficient recycling collection provides more cost predictability, which means fewer shifts in customer rates. For example, SSC had a 25-30% rate increase in 2020 largely driven by the labor market and the volatility of recycling commodity markets. By increasing efficiency and reducing operational costs, waste and recycling collection rates are not as dependent on and influenced by external markets, which allows for smaller rate increases over time.
There are some concerns about contamination with single-stream recycling, with the primary contaminant of concern being broken glass. Higher contamination rates are observed with single-stream recycling than dual, or separated, recycling systems. However, it has been shown in areas with single-stream recycling that the convenience of a single bin results in increased customer participation in recycling. These increased recycling rates, coupled with adjustments as needed – such as separating glass – have the potential to offset increased contamination.
Additionally, contamination already happens with pre-sorting recyclables since consumers may not always know what is and is not recyclable. Fortunately, the recycling processing facilities that Bellingham’s recyclables are shipped to – called MRFs – have advanced technology that can clear these contaminants more effectively than hand-sorting these materials. The MRFs are already equipped to handle single-stream recycling. They have optic reading systems that can identify the useful materials and effectively recycle them.
Many years ago, recycling was added as a minimum service for all residential customers. This evolved into the three-bin, curb-sorted recycling system Bellingham residents used before single-stream recycling. Through this system, customers were responsible for sorting cans/glass/plastic, mixed paper, and newspaper separately.
SSC trucks are not designed to pick up these smaller recycling bins with an automated system. With the 3-bin system, SSC employees had to get out of the truck at every residence to pick up and deposit each of these smaller recycling bins into the truck by hand. This was a much less efficient process and less safe for SSC employees.
The cost to process recycling has increased significantly in recent years across the U.S. Waste collection service providers used to be able to sell recyclables for a small profit to help offset the costs of collection. However, changes in the international recycling commodities market – including a ban on imported recyclables by China in January 2018 – has made processing recycling significantly more expensive.
For example, rather than making a small profit by selling recyclables, SSC now pays $205/ton to have recyclables processed. This is nearly twice as much as the cost of sending garbage to the landfill ($120/ton). These increased costs have affected the entire waste and recycling industry.
More Information
- 2024 Organics Management Laws – Department of Ecology
- December 5, 2024 News Release – Organic waste collection coming to all Bellingham single-family households in 2025
- February 27, 2023 Bellingham City Council meeting – Proposed Resolution Regarding Single Stream Recycling and Organic Materials Collection (Item 23645)
- February 22, 2023 News Release – City Council to consider request to change recycling and waste collection services
- October 24, 2022 Bellingham City Council meeting – Single Stream Recycling Pilot Update (Item 23220)
- 2020 State of Curbside Recycling in U.S. Report by the Recycling Partnership
- 2019 State of Residential Recycling and Organics Collection in Washington State Report by Zero Waste Washington
- City of Bellingham Solid Waste Management
- Whatcom County WasteWise Tool
Contact
Please contact SSC at info@ssc-inc.com or (360) 734-3490 with questions about your waste and recycling collection services. For other questions, please contact the City at AskPW@cob.org.
