Cornell Cooperative Extension volunteers help expand GrassRoots Festival composting efforts

Amy Risen
Jason Koski/University Photography
Amy Risen, left, shares some composting tips Saturday afternoon, July 21, with Kathy and Carl Richardson during 2007 Grassroots Festival in Trumansburg, N.Y. Risen is a Cornell Ph.D. candidate in environmental toxicology as well as a Master Composter.

When Cornell Cooperative Extension of Tompkins County (CCETC) volunteer John Sullivan first approached Finger Lakes GrassRoots Festival organizers in 1995 with the idea to compost at the festival, he reportedly was told, "You can't do that -- we have children here."

Now in its 13th year, the composting program has grown to collect more than 5 tons of material during the four-day music and dance festival. Almost 13,000 people attended the 2007 festival, held July 19-22 at the Trumansburg Fairgrounds, north of Ithaca.

"To see the pounds add up is pretty amazing," said volunteer Jenny Pronto '07, as she and Cornell graduate student Dan Pendleton collected compost on the site.

"On Our Way to Zero Waste" signs touted the latest evolution of the festival's composting effort, which accepted more types of materials than in the past; the materials otherwise would have gone into landfills. (Other festival volunteers collect trash, recyclables and returnable containers and donate bottle-deposit proceeds to local charities.)

The GrassRoots performer hospitality area was geared to serve approximately 13,000 meals during the festival, with not one regular trash can in sight. Everything used by hospitality visitors -- napkins, plates, cups, forks and spoons -- was entirely compostable, along with their food scraps.

Each year, CCETC volunteers collect compost and staff an information tent at the festival to educate the public about home composting. The outreach mission includes Compost Theatre, featuring volunteer actors who use stories, props and costumes to educate small children (and parents).

"There's a lot of levels of composting going on here," said Adam Michaelides '96, a volunteer who coordinates CCETC's Compost Education Program.

Large blue collection bins and white plastic five-gallon compost buckets dotted the festival site, and smaller covered containers were distributed in festival camping areas this year and collected by volunteers.

"It's a way to reach more people and go out where they are," Michaelides said. The total collected at this year's festival was 10,040 pounds. Program volunteers collected 8,275 pounds of compost at GrassRoots in 2005 and 6,630 pounds in 2006. The decrease was attributed in part to less waste from festival food vendors.

"One year we composted over 2,000 pounds of bagels and bread," Michaelides said. "We were able to tell the vendors, which helped to eliminate waste on that end."

In past years, most composting was done on the festival site, in up to 25 welded-wire cylindrical compost bins layered with straw. This year, the compost went offsite to Cayuga Compost, which delivered 62 of its blue 64-gallon collection bins to the fairgrounds. The commercial facility's compost pile generates enough heat (in excess of 130 degrees) to process animal bones and meat, cooking oil, dairy products and biodegradable plastics made from vegetable starch. All of these were collected at the festival for the first time.

About half of the 34 composting program volunteers at the fairgrounds were trained as Master Composters in an extension course offered from February to April. The volunteer force grows every year, Michaelides said, and they also work at the Ithaca Festival in June, Apple Harvest Festival in October and a Compost Fair held in conjunction with Ithaca Earth Day in April.

CCETC holds free composting classes at Ithaca community gardens, the last Saturday of the month from June to October. Also, worm composting (vermiculture) classes "are very popular -- people jostle for position in the classes," Michaelides said. "A worm bin, or a couple of bins, can really take care of all your scraps -- they make really good compost."

 

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