Home Composting and Recycling Are Getting the High-Tech Treatment

Many of us are already composting food scraps and recycling everything we can, all in the name of reducing landfill waste. But at-home composting and recycling are getting a high-tech makeover.

People are starting to show a strong interest in living more eco-friendly lifestyles. Globally, 85% of people have adopted more sustainable purchase behaviors in the last five years. Now, with at-home electric composters and improved recycling technology on the market, it's easier than ever to better the planet from the comfort of your home.

Let's start with electric composters. According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), "more food reaches landfills and incinerators than any other single material in our everyday trash." Instead of being sent to landfills where it releases greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming, this waste can be composted.

While kitchen counter compost bins are great, electric composters like Pela's Lomi and Vitamix's FoodCycler offer a level of convenience that traditional composting doesn’t. To use these electronic devices, simply throw your food scraps in. When the bin is full, cover it up and press a button. The composter will do all the work to dry, grind, and reduce your scraps to a finer material—compost.

According to Alex Dubro, a circular economy expert and the director of operations at MeCycle, at-home composting is a lot easier than traditional composting methods.

"There’s a learning curve to composting," Dubro says. "It looks fun, yes. But it gets complicated once you start to consider pH (acidity/alkalinity levels), wetness, the volume of waste, the proportion of ‘greens’ (nitrogen-intensive organics) and ‘browns’ (carbon-intensive organics), and more. With all of that in mind, at-home composting makes it so you put it in the electric composter, and it’s done between 8 to 48 hours."

That’s pretty hard to beat, right? That convenience factor is just one reason why high-tech, at-home composting is becoming trendier. "They're more expensive than traditional composters, but given how quickly the composting process is completed, it starts to make sense," he says.

Not only is 2022 the year of decreasing food waste. It's also the year of recycling—especially with the latest at-home recycling solutions. New innovations like Lasso Loop—the first-ever at-home recycling solution that recently debuted at the 2022 Consumer Electronics Show—are bringing recycling to you.

In a nutshell, the Lasso Loop does what electric composters do for compost, but for recycling. And like the electric composters, technology like the Lasso Loop has the advantage of convenience on its side.

"For consumers, this could make their lives much more convenient," Dubro says. "They won't have to bring it to the curb once or twice each week. They won’t have to handle bins in their garage or wherever else they store them. They don’t need to interface with a property manager. Everything becomes a lot more straightforward: Put your recycling in the Lasso Loop in your kitchen, then schedule a pickup every so often."

However, convenience isn’t the only benefit of at-home recycling. With this high-tech option starting to make its way into homes, our planet will likely see changes that could help fight the climate crisis.

"Recycling, and waste collection and disposal in general, has a very large carbon footprint," Dubro adds. "Additionally, trucks need to be maintained (which is labor-intensive), labor needs to be sourced, and storage needs to be found when a truck is done for the day."

So these high-tech upgrades are bringing more than just convenience to your home. They're also keeping waste—both food and plastic waste—out of the landfill. Keep your eyes peeled for more at-home composting and recycling units hitting the market—this is surely just the beginning.