2021 June Compost Giveback

June 10, 2021

The GrowNYC Compost Program is typically focused on collecting your food scraps, but from June 12 to June 27, we’re also giving away free compost made from the food scraps we’ve collected in the last year! This is our annual act of reciprocity: we're closing the loop and giving thanks to the thousands of New Yorkers who have saved their food scraps from landfills by bringing them to our Food Scrap Drop-off sites. Small, 2-pound bags of ready-to-use compost will be available on a first-come, first-served basis while supplies last, as outlined below.

Compost Made in NYC

The compost for this Giveback is provided by NYC Compost Project hosted by Earth Matter NY, whose community composting facility and learning center on Governors Island has processed 40% of the food scraps collected by GrowNYC in the last year. If you’ve dropped off food scraps with GrowNYC, then the bag of compost you’ll receive may contain nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium from your very own peels and pits. That’s what we mean when we say “closed loop.”

Compost Giveback Schedule

The following GrowNYC Food Scrap Drop-off sites will host one Compost Giveback event each this June. Please refer to our Compost Program Webpage for site-specific hours and locations. Quantities are limited and based on average weekly participation at each drop-off site, so consider coming early to make sure you get a bag.

Saturday, June 12th

  • Abingdon Greenmarket
  • Tribeca Greenmarket
  • Inwood Greenmarket

Sunday, June 13th

  • 79th Greenmarket

Friday, June 18th

  • 97th St Greenmarket
  • East 96th St & Lexington Ave
  • William B. Washington Memorial Garden

Saturday, June 19th

  • McCarren Park/ Greenmarket
  • Fort Greene Greenmarket

Friday, June 25th

  • Fordham Plaza
  • Lincoln Hospital Greenmarket
  • New Roots Community Farm

Saturday, June 26th

  • Bed-Stuy Fresh Food Box

Sunday, June 27th

  • Carroll Gardens Greenmarket
  • Cortelyou Greenmarket

How to Use Compost

You don’t need to have a backyard or garden to have a use for compost. Indoor plants benefit from an annual application of compost, and we all have access to street trees that can use some love. We recommend mixing your compost into soil at a ratio of at least 3 parts soil to 1 part compost for best results.

  • For outdoor plants: Rake, sprinkle, or mix the compost into the soil of garden or tree beds.
  • For indoor plants: Gently mix an inch of compost into the top layer of potting soil, or blend with potting soil when repotting.

Compost is not shelf-stable, and will not store well. Please use your compost within a week or two of receiving it.

Our Compost Giveback bags are also compostable. Please remove and recycle the tin tie before bringing the empty bag back to a GrowNYC Food Scrap Drop-off site for composting.

What is compost, anyway?

During Compost Giveback events, there’s often some confusion about what we’re giving away and why. Here are a few definitions to know:

  • Food Scraps (noun) – the uneaten foods or parts of food. Calling these items scraps, rather than waste, highlights their value and potential for beneficial use, including human and animal consumption of rescued edible foods, composting, and anaerobic digestion.

  • Composting (verb) - the process of aerobic, biological decomposition that transforms organic materials like food scraps and fallen leaves into compost.

  • Compost (noun) – a soil amendment that resembles dark, crumbly topsoil, has a pleasant earthy smell, and has no resemblance to the original organic materials from which it is made. Compost refers to the finished product of the composting process, and is not to be confused with food scraps, which are just one ingredient in the composting process.

  • Soil (noun) – the upper layer of earth in which plants grow. Healthy soil consists of 45% minerals, 25% water, 25% air, and 5% organic matter. Soil is not to be confused with compost, which is a soil amendment that adds organic matter and beneficial microbes to soil.

When you drop off your food scraps with GrowNYC, we bring them to composting facilities, where they’re mixed with carbon-rich materials like leaves and wood chips, and transformed into compost. The finished compost can be used to improve soil quality for houseplants, gardens, and street trees alike.

Additional Resources


The compost giveback is made possible by funding from the NYC Department of Sanitation and Closed Loop Partners.

NYC Zero Waste During COVID-19

The coronavirus outbreak has suspended many of the zero waste programs New Yorkers have come to rely on, including GrowNYC’s zero waste programs, DSNY’s curbside compost program, and the citywide network of food scrap drop-off sites. 

While GrowNYC’s zero waste services are not currently operational, we know our community continues to care about the long-term sustainability of our city and looks to us for information.  The resources and updates below are subject to change--please check host information before you go and be patient as the city works through this public health crisis.  Remember, it's great to recycle and rot, but it's best to reduce and reuse to prevent waste!

Household Recyclables

  • NYC’s curbside recycling program is still in effect. Thank a sanitation worker, and make sure to check recycling rules and rinse containers! 

Food Waste

Clothing + Textiles

Electronics

Reusable Items

Handy Tips for a Sustainable Holiday

November 26, 2019
Posted in Recycling | Tagged recycle

 

Green Your Holidays

Making a list of how to green your holidays? Here are some of our favorite tips and events to cure the post-holiday blues.

Pre-cycle

Whether you're hosting a gathering or just giving and receiving, clearing out excess can make for a more sustainable holiday season.  Find new homes for unwanted items through clothing collections, coat drives, Stop 'N' Swap® events, holiday toy drives, or DonateNYC reuse partners--you'll have more room to celebrate, and an easier time recycling and reusing your post-holiday waste.

Sending cards?

Try e-cards or look for greetings made with recycled content (the more post-consumer content, the better).

Giving gifts?

Show some style when shopping by bringing your own reusable bags. Choose minimally-packaged items made with recycled content and give items that will be treasured, not thrown out before the next holiday season. Consider giving experiences, homemade, and vintage gifts. Find new joy in old favorites that are broken or need refreshing with Fixers Collective. Get hundreds of toy-free gift ideas for a more meaningful holiday here and here, and get great tips from Wired's review of the 5 Best Toys of All Time.  Remember to wrap it recyclable by using old newspaper, paper gift wrap, paper gift bags, or reusable bags and containers that keep on giving all year. 

Preparing a holiday meal?

Look for items in recyclable packaging and buy minimally- or non-packaged fresh produce, like that from Greenmarket. Get meal planning and food storage tips from Save the Food, and read a thorough overview of sustainable Thanksgiving meal planning.    Easily compost vegetable trimmings by using drop-offs at select Greenmarkets and other locations. Serve your masterpiece on reusable plates and offer guests reusable flatware, glassware, and napkins.  Prevent waste by making small changes such as using recyclable aluminum foil rather than plastic wrap for food storage.

Stuck with clean up duties?

Wrapping paper, gift boxes, cardboard, and other paper packaging can go out with other paper recycling (remove tape, ribbons, and other decorations).  Eggnog cartons, wine bottles, olive containers, cookie tins, and hard-to-open rigid plastic packaging are easy to recycle alongside the rest of your metal, glass, plastic, and cartons.  If your curbside recycling day falls on Christmas and New Year's Day, here's when to set out recycling, garbage, and organics (if participating).  Foam peanut packaging and plastic foam blocks are not recyclable, but alternative paper packaging can be included in your recycling pile.  Foam peanuts can be reused at select shipping centers and Manhattan Mailroom locations, and cornstarch peanuts can be composted.  For those so inclined, even corks can be recycled—find drop-sites here

Too many leftovers?

Save take-out containers to send guests home with another helping.  Check the shelf life of open and unopened food and get storage tips to make the most of food and create less waste at stilltasty.com.

Post-Holiday Recycling Events to Cure the Winter Blues

Recycle Your Tree.

If you're putting up a real tree for the holidays, plan to chip in at MulchFest!  Trees (cleaned of stands, lights, tinsel and ornaments) will be collected and recycled into mulch for NYC parks at designated sites from December 26, 2019 - January 11, 2020. Bring your own bag to chipping sites and take home mulch for your yard, garden or street tree. Find citywide drop-off sites and mulch pick-up locations here*. If you miss MulchFest, the city will pick up trees (also stripped of ornaments, etc) curbside from January 6 - 17, barring any snow disruptions. 

Recycle Unwanted Electronics.

Certain electronics are banned from disposal.  When upgrading or unloading electronics, many recycling options are available at no cost, including curbside pickup for homes in the outerborosFind more recycling resources here and check in with the Lower East Side Ecology Center, which runs the Gowanus E-Waste Warehouse in Brooklyn and hosts "After the Holidays" e-waste collections in all five boroughs.

Loosen Your Drawers.

Clear out ill-fitting, outdated and otherwise unwanted clothing, shoes, and linens and bring them to one of GrowNYC's weekly collections for reusable clothing and other textiles.

Swap Your Stuff.

GrowNYC's Stop 'N' Swap® is the ultimate re-gifting party. Bring reusable items to share (portable items only) or simply bring a tote bag or two to take home things you can put to reuse. Unstuff your home at one of two swaps in December, or find winter swap dates and locations at GrowNYC.org/swap.

 

From all of us at GrowNYC, thank you for helping green our city by taking our "recycling challenge" at community events, volunteering as an Environmental Ambassador, dropping off clothing and food scraps at our Greenmarkets, attending our Stop 'N' Swaps, and more throughout 2019. We look forward to seeing you out at many of the great recycling events that will kick off a sustainable 2020. Happy Holidays!

Caught Up in Kondo? Don’t Spark Joy in Landfills!

April 6, 2019
Posted in Recycling | Tagged swap, reuse, donate, recycle, reduce


Making up just 5% of the world’s population, the US consumes 30% of the world’s resources and creates 30% of the world’s waste.  We have so much stuff that finding a place to put it is big business; the self-storage industry is booming. Today, it is physically possible for every American to stand at the same time under the canopy of self-storage roofing in the US.  It’s no surprise, then, that Marie Kondo, author of best-selling book “The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up,” has started a de-cluttering craze.

On her Netflix show, Kondo teaches clients to make their homes more livable through her special organizing process. The result is large piles of garbage bags filled with clothing, home furnishings, and other items that no longer “spark joy” for their owners.  Read on for tips to break free of clutter, sustainably! 

The true solution to too much stuff, of course, is to consume less, buy better, and care for what we already have—this makes it easier to maintain a comfortable home, and helps the planet too!  Next time you put your stuff on the curb, consider that for every garbage can placed out for collection, the equivalent of 71 garbage cans' worth of waste is created in mining, agriculture and other industrial processes to convert raw materials into finished products and packaging. 

Tips to Responsibly De-Clutter Your Life:

1: Clear it out.  To achieve the highest use for unwanted items, choose to swap or donate what’s usable.  For items such as electronics, household chemicals, and personal documents, check out local resources and special events to recycle or safely dispose.   Need a little extra help getting started? Check out How to Declutter Your Home Fast: A Checklist for the Messy.

2: Get organized.When you’ve successfully pared down, reorder your home for daily life.Good organization keeps you from buying things you don’t need or already own, and can create a happier, less stressful living environment.Check out 10 Ways to Unclutter Your Life.  

3: Change habits.To remain clutter free, slow the flow of new things into your home.  Prevent future waste buy buying wisely—choose high quality items you truly need and intend to use.  Try out zero waste practices like repairing what you already own and love,  (see Fixers Collective, Mend It Mondays, Fix It Fridays) and buying bulk and package-free groceries.  Spend less time shopping and managing stuff, and more time on non-commercial activities like enjoying culture, spending time in nature, and volunteering.

Want to stay on top of NYC zero waste news and resources? Subscribe to our monthly NYC Recycling Updates!

It Takes a Metropolis

March 9, 2019


Every year hundreds of everyday heroes help guide their fellow New Yorkers down the path to zero waste by keeping clothing and food scraps out of landfills, reusing items too good to toss, and by adopting new habits to reduce waste and recycle more.  Check out our new video to peek into the exciting world of our zero waste volunteers and the invaluable work that they do! Itching to get involved? Follow the link to sign up for an upcoming orientation or opportunity: http://bit.ly/recycleopps

Host Your Own Community Swap!

January 2, 2019

Hosting a Swap is as Easy as D-I-Y with GrowNYC’s Guide to Community Reuse Events

We are pleased to announce the release of our new DIY Swap Guide!

Since 2007, GrowNYC has hosted 270 Stop ‘N’ Swap® community reuse events across all five boroughs. Our goal is to provide each of NYC’s 59 community districts an annual opportunity to find new homes for unwanted items that might otherwise end up in a landfill.  Still, the demand for reuse and desire to host and participate in community swaps extends beyond our program’s capacity. We created this guide to assist schools, community organizations, and passionate individuals interested in hosting their own swap events!

Whether you are looking to host a curated event for items such as clothes, books, or toys, or a big event where anything goes, the guide will help you identify an event location, map out your swap footprint, gather event materials, outline a training for your volunteers, and more.  We hope this guide will be a launching pad for more free reuse events across NYC.  

If you use our guide to host a swap, we’d love to hear from you! Feel free to send us a note at recycle@grownyc.org or tag us on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram (@GrowNYC). 

Need further incentive to try out some creative reuse ideas in your neighborhood? Citizens Committee is currently accepting applications for micro-grants of up to $3,000 to resident-led groups working on community projects in the NYC, including those related to waste diversion. For more information, visit their website here.

Happy swapping! 

Celebrating Our 250th Stop ‘N’ Swap®

September 21, 2018
Posted in Recycling | Tagged swap, Stop 'N' Swap, reduce, reuse, recycle

Stop 'N' Swap 250

At GrowNYC, there’s no stopping when it comes to swapping!  In an effort to reduce NYC’s waste and help more New Yorkers reuse perfectly good items, our zero waste programs funded by DSNY set out to provide an annual swap event for every community district in the five boroughs. 

This year we celebrate our 250th Stop ‘N’ Swap in NYC – all thanks to dedicated staff, our passionate volunteers, and diverse community partners, who make more than 50 swaps a year possible!

At Stop ‘N’ Swap, the public is invited to bring clean, portable, reusable items to share with those who can use them. No one is required to bring something to take something — you can simply show up with a bag and see what’s free for the taking. Clothing, books, housewares, electronics, and toys are just some of the offerings.  Recent memorable treasures include peanut butter and jelly pillowcases, pocket mouse, grass jelly, an amateur radio calendar, and plants potted just for fellow swappers (view photos).

Since 2008, more than 62,000 New Yorkers have attended a Stop ‘N’ Swap co-hosted by more than 135 different community partners and supported by over 1,200 volunteers.  In just 5 years, participants have kept more than half a million pounds of reusable items out of landfills. 

80% of products in the US are used once, then thrown away — find a Stop 'N' Swap near you and start reusing today!

Environmental Ambassadors at NYCHA

February 12, 2016
Posted in Recycling | Tagged recycle, volunteer, NYCHA, recycling



Over the past year, an exciting thing has been happening: recycling is rolling out at NYCHA developments citywide.  As a partner in community engagement, GrowNYC has provided recycling education at workshops and events, aiming to change the way more than 400,000 New Yorkers take out the trash. 

This winter, GrowNYC is launching a new volunteer program for NYCHA residents who want to see this program succeed.  Through our Environmental Ambassadors program, we will train volunteers to educate neighbors about recycling at their developments.  After completing two, 2-hour workshops, Environmental Ambassadors conduct 12 hours of local outreach to encourage participation in the NYCHA Recycles! Program.  Volunteer benefits include field trips, gear, gift bags and a certificate of service signed by the DNSY commissioner and a NYCHA executive. 

Live at NYCHA and want to make a positive change where you live?  Learn more and register today!

GrowNYC's zero waste programs funded by the NYC Department of Sanitation. 

Have a More Sustainable Holiday

December 8, 2015

You've made a gift list and planned the menu, now here's your holiday recycling checklist:

  • Wrapping paper, gift boxes, cardboard and other paper packaging can go out with other paper recycling (remove tape, ribbons and other decorations). 
     
  • Eggnog cartons, wine bottles, olive containers, cookie tins and hard-to-open rigid plastic packaging are easy to recycle alongside the rest of your metal, glass, plastic and cartons
     
  • Block Styrofoam and foam peanut packaging are not recyclable, but alternative paper packaging can be included in your recycling pile.  Styrofoam peanuts can be reused, and cornstarch peanuts can be composted. 
     
  • For those so inclined, even corks can be recycled--find drop-sites here 

Visit our Holiday Tips page for post-holiday tree collections, electronics recycling events and community swap events. 

For more tips on keeping your holidays green and merry, visit the NYC ZeroWaste page.

Five Million Hi-Fives to Greenmarket Composters!

August 3, 2015
Posted in Recycling | Tagged recycle, compost, greenmarket

Spring, winter, summer or fall, New Yorkers are increasingly dedicated to building a collective compost pile, facilitated by Greenmarkets and community composters throughout the city.  In partnership with the NYC Department of Sanitation, GrowNYC has diverted more than 5 million pounds of residential food scraps from disposal.  Material dropped off at Greenmarkets is distributed to a network of local compost sites, such as Earth Matter on Governor’s Island, where chickens get the first “peck” of the scraps, and Red Hook Farm, where unwanted scraps are transformed to nurture a new crop of Brooklyn-grown vegetables.   Whether your haul is large or small, we thank YOU for your contributions to this effort!  Learn more about food scrap collections at Greenmarket.    

           

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