Jul 18 - Entrepreneurs Cash in by Composting and Recycling

ShareAs incentives to recycle and compost increase, along with consumer demand for greener products, new businesses are forming to take advantage of these opportunities while simultaneously diverting waste from landfills.

In New York, one young entrepreneur came up with a business idea based on the bottle bill after he found out 103 million dollars in recyclable can deposits had gone unclaimed in a single year. When the state raised the handling fee for recycled containers and expanded its bottle bill to include water bottles, he saw a business opportunity, according to a Waste & Recycling News article. The concept is simple: he goes to businesses, collects their recyclables, donates the 5 cent deposit to a charity of their choice, and generates income from the 3.5 cent handling fee.

Similarly, another eco-minded businessman started his own company in Utah when he realized how much food waste was being thrown away in his college town. The company takes these produce scraps, composts them within 3 weeks, and converts the material into soil for resell. Normally, companies pay to haul away their food waste by weight with the rest of their trash, but this company gives them a cheaper alternative. Its 2011 revenue is expected to be 1.5 million, according to another article by Waste & Recycling News.

CAW knows too, that being environmentally conscious can make economic sense. That’s why we’ve created our 2011 Plan for Protecting Our Environment and Creating Green Jobs.

To read more about our 2011 Agenda, click here.