Blue planet, green ideas | Solutions for composting in large buildings

Managing the banana peels, carrot stems, chicken bones and egg shells of dozens of residents is no small task. Now that compost collection is being rolled out in buildings with more than nine housing units in Montreal, are the people who live there condemned to dealing with bad odors and unwanted insects?

Not at all, say building managers and owners, who have found solutions to collect and store these materials without causing any inconvenience.

The game is not won, however: on average, in all Montreal neighborhoods, the participation rate in compost collection is only 35% and is increasing very slowly, even if the City had the intention to see it reach 60% in 2025.

Plan ahead

Residents of multi-unit buildings have an additional difficulty: Due to limited space, they generally have fewer options for waste storage.

But newly constructed buildings are starting to plan for this at the design stage, integrating systems and spaces to facilitate composting.

This is the case in the 216 rental housing units newly built by the real estate developer Maître Carré, in the Centre-Sud district: in addition to the traditional waste chutes installed on each floor, there are also compost chutes.

In the basement, the compostable materials end up in a brown bin that the janitor takes care of changing when it is full.

“The falls are self-cleaning and are treated with UV rays with the Sanuvox system to eliminate odors,” explains the operations coordinator for the developer, Carol-Ann Brochu. “As the bins are in the basement, it will also stay cool in the summer. »

For recycling, tenants must take their materials down to the basement themselves, in the large bins provided for this purpose.

For the real estate developer, such a composting installation in its new buildings was a matter of course. We want to encourage healthy and responsible lifestyles, explains Maître Carré.

The South Center building also has around sixty gardening containers on the roof.

Challenge in old buildings

New buildings are great: their designers can provide facilities that meet today’s needs. But in existing buildings, isn’t it complicated to install a composting system for dozens, even hundreds of residents?

“It can be difficult,” replies Peter Annoussis, concierge for three buildings comprising 130 condos, in the Saint-Laurent borough.

All three buildings have garbage chutes on each floor, but residents must go downstairs to deposit recyclable and compostable materials in the basement.

In the borough of Saint-Laurent, in areas where compost collection is offered every week, garbage is only collected once every two weeks. We hope this will serve as an incentive to compost. Without organic matter, waste should not generate odors, emphasizes the borough’s mayor, Alan DeSousa.

When there is not enough space for storing compost bins, there are other solutions, explains the mayor of Saint-Laurent, which was one of the first boroughs to introduce compost collection in large buildings.

In partnership with a building owner on Rue Ouimet, the borough installed semi-buried containers outside for waste, compost and recycling. At the bottom of the containers, the materials remain fresh, which prevents odors.

“We must debunk the myths about odors, insects and vermin,” insists Marie-Andrée Mauger, responsible for the environment on the executive committee. And people need to understand that participating in compost collection is not optional. It is mandatory where people have access to it, so they cannot put organic matter in the waste. »

However, the City is not “in fine-issuing mode,” she said.

Currently, 80% of Montreal households have access to compost collection. In buildings with nine or more units, 50% have access, and deployment continues.

“The challenges are enormous in changing behavior,” recognizes Alan de Sousa. Even if there are recalcitrant citizens, they must understand that composting is not a choice, but an obligation. This is a real societal change. »