How To Recycle Or Compost Dairy Products 🐮

Can You Compost Dairy? 🐮: In this blog, we discover the possibility of recycling or composting your dairy products that you have at your area. Which is the better option – recycling or composting? Waster weighs in on this below. Continue reading this blog to learn more. 

I, in particular, love having lots of food in my fridge. I call them ‘essentials in my fridge‘. These include eggs, fresh fruits and vegetables, butter, milk, cheese, cream, yoghurt and more (of course, this depends on my budget).

Did you notice anything from the examples I have mentioned?

If you have noticed, a lot of the food products I mentioned are all dairy products. I love having different types of dairy products in my fridge because of the many dishes I can create using them and their provided health benefits such as fortifying your teeth and bones.

Buttermilk pancakes in the morning, garlic dough balls stuffed with cheese whenever time I want – these are just some examples of what I cook using dairy products. Talk about versatility!

I, of course, make sure not to waste any dairy products (or any other food products – just wanted to emphasise on dairy products) when consuming them. Unfortunately, this is not completely avoidable as you and I can easily still leave some dairy products food waste when prepping a dish. So, what can you do with this type of food waste?

Can you recycle dairy products? Or, should you look to compost dairy, instead? Below, we answer important questions that you need to know. Read on to learn more.

Short answer: to deal with dairy products, it is better to compost them.

–  Mr Waster

Waster provides readily-available recycling solutions for small and medium Aussie businesses

Before we take you further into the discussion and determine what you should do with your dairy products – if you should go on and recycle them or setting up to compost them, we want to share Waster with you.

Who is Waster? Why do plenty consider it as one of the best waste and recycling companies in Australia?

>Download Now: Free PDF Business Owners Guide To Commingled Recycling Bin Services

Simply put, Waster provides you with innovative solutions for your and your business’s waste management and recycling needs. In addition to that, we provide flexible, 30-day contracts instead of the typical lock-in contracts, which proves a better choice nowadays.

Click on the blue button below to learn more.

READ: Is It Possible To Recycle Deodorant Containers? ♻️ 

You should look to compost your dairy

You cannot place your dairy products in the recycling bin. Reusing and recycling, after all, is not possible with any kind of food waste. With that said, we strictly discourage you from placing your dairy product food waste into your general waste bin.

If those above are not viable options, then what should you do?

The answer: by composting them. You can compost dairy products and place them in your organic or food waste composting bin. This is a much better option than placing them in your general waste bin and sending them to landfill. Placing dairy products in landfill and letting them break down there will yield undesirable results such as producing a foul odour and creating leachate that can contaminate soil and groundwater.

“What if I want to compost dairy myself? Is that possible?” This is a question Mr Waster received a while back. Let us delve more into this and discuss the answer to this question below.

Composting dairy products yourself

Like we have already talked about in dealing with egg shells and bone and shells food waste, you can create a compost yourself and add in dairy products. However, you should do so carefully as you might ruin the composting process. Here is what you should do to successfully turn your dairy into compost without a hitch.

First, you should take note that food waste, especially dairy products, have high moisture and fat content – especially fat content. High fat contents, if left unregulated in dairy products, may slow down the composting process due to it producing a damp-proof coating that can block out air needed for decomposition.

As a result of blocking out air, not only do you slow down the composting process, but you also allow anaerobic decomposition (i.e., composting with the absence of air). This will result in your dairy products, along with other food waste, producing a foul smell (the smell of ammonia).

What should you to avoid this? We elaborate further below.

• Make sure to create a compost pile that can accommodate how much dairy food waste you have. What do we mean by this? To put it simply, you should put enough dairy products proportionate to your compost pile. Have plenty and large amounts of dairy food products? Then create a bigger compost! Larger piles produce more heat, which can easily kill any pathogen created from waste such as dairy products.
• Put the dairy in the center of the pile. Doing so will prevent leachate from forming. Putting dairy products on top of a nest of ‘browns’ (e.g., dry leaves, twigs etc. – dry materials full of fibre) will prompt the browns to act as filter to break the leachate down. Remember, if you have plenty of dairy products, mix them with plenty of brown materials!
• Break them into smaller pieces. Make sure to break down the dairy products into smaller pieces so that they can break down faster. Breaking them down will also avoid anaerobic composting.

Final reminders: put the pile far away from water supply as to avoid leachate. Additionally, turn them regularly so air can easily go through the pile whilst you compost dairy products.

Waster’s organic food waste service

For small and medium Aussie businesses, we provide organic food waste services for you.

Organic waste services in 120 litre bin sizes: Please contact our customer service team for larger bin options. By removing food items from your general waste bin, you can reduce the weight and hence cost of waste management for your business and significantly boost your overall recycling performance.

And, as mentioned above, you also divert food waste from landfill!

Do not put a plastic bag or any other contaminants; facilities cannot treat them and they will ruin a whole batch.

Contact Waster right now for your waste and recycling needs!

Does your Australian-based business need waste and recycling services? If so, then you have come to the right web page!

Please call 1300 WASTER (1300 927 837).  You can also email us at enquiries@waster.com.au if you have any further questions. Find the best deals in terms of waste and recycling pricing and services!