Except that here in Toronto, our compost "green bins" accept all but the cooking oil on this 'non-compostable' list as well as napkins/tissues/paper towels, and our recycling "blue bins" take all paper, juice and wax paper cartons.
Instead of discouraging composting and recycling, why not encourage people to check with local facilities to see what is acceptable in their area?

Don't recycle them to me means don't buy them. Get your juice in glass containers, boycott magazines like Oprah who insist on coating their paper and write to her about this; they have enough money for a switch to post-consumer recycled, for god's sake. And don't bother with "reusing" your paper bags or newspaper for a single "second" use in wrapping presents; the tape and such will just make it unrecyclable. Use cloth towels or a scarf instead.

Wish I could opt out of the local weekly newspaper and flyers, and the Sunday paper that they drop as advertising to get us to get a subscription.

I agree with both commenters above - I am from Toronto as well and our green bins do take on many items you list as non-compostable... even used diapers and kitty/doggy litter!

Ugh... this list generalizes too much. @e-town from t-town is correct: You can compost all those items except oil in Toronto's municipal system. And some of those "non-recyclable" items are recyclable here, too. The green bin also asks for wet paper towel, kleenex and napkins, paper egg cartons, paper sugar bags and requests that you leave out "biodegradable" plastic bags.

The best thing to do is look at your city's recycling home page, not a page that doesn't have anything to do with your city or system.

AT shouldn't be framing articles like this as the authority since it's bound to cause more mistakes than corrections. Perhaps taking a quote from the website referenced would have been a prudent choice:

"Your municipal recycling system gets the final say as to what belongs in your bin. Some areas will restrict more items that we've listed. Other have special programs for dealing with problematic materials. In most cases, municipal systems are happy to provide written guidelines. Wondering how to recycle something your local system won’t take? Pop over to the Earth911 website and see what is available in your area."

:-/

I was going to say that what is recycleable often depends upon local communities and the agreements made with haulers or recycling handling centers.

Canada apparently has a different set of standards.

I give you credit for posting about composting and recycling to raise awareness, however, this list is more or less useless.
Some facilities can accept certain items that others cannot accept (mine just started accepting soda bottles with the screw caps on them). This varies from state to state, even from town to town. The only item that can never be recycled is missing from your list - greasy paper (pizza boxes!) belongs in the trash.
You are better off checking with your local trash/recycling company and using their recommendations.

http://www.organicgardening.com/learn-and-grow/composting-101
Here's a better source to help those who might want to start composting. I agree with many of these comments about this post being much to general. I compost bread and rice and have no problem with pests or bacteria. My garden LOVES the compost I give it every year. Don't be afraid of bugs however. They are a part of the natural composting process.

My recycle company doesn't except plastic bags so I stopped getting them...I ask only for paper which I can use to put recyclables in AND the only way they'll accept shredded paper.

I work at a hospital in Boston and the company we use to recycle our waste will even take greasy pizza boxes, so yes, I agree - the list is a waste unless you check directly with your municipality.

Not just Canada--also Seattle, where both dairy and meat items are compostable, as well as bread and rice.

In Seattle greasy pizza boxes go in the compost bin as do all the items listed as non-compostable above except the oil. Like Toronto, we can also recycle most of what you list as not recyclable.

A little naughty Emmi to say dont bother re-using paper/wrapping paper to wrap presents. You assume that we'll all use tape - when I use ribbon time and time again. Ill well known for giving a gift and then retrieving the ribbon....and flat things like books dont need ribbon or take - do the usual corner folding, and tuck the paper inside - it does work. Ask a picture framer if Im not making sense. Over here in the midlands (england) you can stick pretty much everything in the recycling bags (not food, cooked or otherwise). Makes it easy, but lots of people still cant be bothered. Although this artical has its faults, it has succeeded in opening a debate....

Can you recycle plastic sandwich bags? My friends insist you can, along with the plastic type of bags that come inside your cereal box. I always thought those weren't allowed. Does anyone know for sure?

It's also worth mentioning that bokashi composting allows for a wider range of items to be included, is a shorter process, isn't finicky like aerobic composting and vermicomposting, and can be done anywhere (I'm an apartment dweller and have mine in my utility room!).

Yep - San Francisco compost allows bread, meat, oil, rice - any kind of food (as well as coated paper). AT, do your homework! No need to add to the confusion.

I want to move to Toronto! In my small Midwestern city we have to haul our own recycling, & what they will take is still limited--just added plastic 4 & 5. I've never had a problem putting rice or bread on my compost, either. Would love an alternative to sending cat litter/dog poop to the landfill' our local ag extension agent says not to compost it, not sure why not.
AT, PLEASE do a post on worm bins! I've been flirting with the idea for a couple of years now.

@3dogma

There have been a few posts already on that topic:

Google is your friend!

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/how-to-start-a-home-worm-compo-108022

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/the-worm-factor-119448

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/best-composters-tools-2009-88186

I agree about the bread and rice; I've never had any problems with them, either. I use vermicomposting, and those little guys love bread. I also have a lot of black soldier flies, which are great for composting, and not pests at all. The combination leads to the kitchen waste being consumed before it can decompose. Anyone composting kitchen waste on their property should have a good bin or some setup to avoid real pests (in my neighborhood it's skunks). I do find it is necessary to have two piles; one for kitchen waste, which is consumed quickly, and one for yard waste, which decomposes slowly. When I only have one pile for both, the slow decomposition of kitchen waste could get a bit stinky.

These guidelines are so different from city to city that it's really not that useful to post this (sorry!). If you are a home composter, it may be useful, but if your city picks up green compost bins, most things you listed really are fair game.

We've got a useful Infographic on composting for the home composter here : composting at home.

plastic bottle caps are recyclable in Minneapolis now (as far as I know). Nonetheless, Juut salons, and any Aveda concept salon for that matter, accept drop-offs of your bottle caps. They send them to Aveda Corp.

Yep, as someone already said, Seattle allows pretty much any manner of food to be tossed in the compost bin. This includes meat scraps, bones, shellfish, eggs, their shells, heck, even compostable food trays, plates and other paper that is used around food, but the thing is, it has to be printed with brown biodegradable ink, or is tan/buff in nature, and this includes Styrofoam like meat trays, plastic like flatware etc, Only milk cartons and other wax coated cardboard/paper can't be recycled.

Even pizza boxes can go in the recycling now too, or other paper type plates, within reason that has food on it.

I forget what all in the way of plastics, but Seattle now recycles glass bottles, jars, aluminum and tin cans, most types of plastics, newspaper, cardboard etc.

Every apartment has bins for all that, and even compostable liner bags are OK, as long as they are approved by Cedar Grove landfill and Glad's Compostable liners are one such product approved for use.

And I should say, all paper/cardboard that is not wax coated but had been in contact with food goes in the compost bin.

I can't figure out why you haven't at least taken this off of the quick links at the bottom of the pages. When reader after reader comments negatively, it makes me wonder how seriously you take our comments.

I put all my shredded paper in my compost bin (kind of the ultimate in data security - it never leaves my property!). It's awesome to keep mold from forming if the compost is too wet and makes nice fluffy compost.

My biggest problem is moles living in the middle of the compost bin through the winter. It must stay warm in there because every Spring when I start to turn the contents again, I have to shoo the family of moles out of there.

Rice? Really? We've always composted that white stuff that we get when we forget to tell the restaurant that we don't want it with our takeout. I didn't think any vermin, even microscopic, exist that would want it!

used pizza boxes and tape are recyclable (this week). given that most gov'ts change items depending on how much $ is paid, not because everything should be recycled, it is best to check periodically what is ok. best comment above: limit the purchase of questionable items in the first place. we have so far to grow in this.

Yup, Seattle is a great place to live! Look to the models established here & work in your municipality to adopt the awesome recycling program we have.

I'm a Torontonian as well, and before my fellow Hogtowners get too self-satisfied you should know that 1) the city doesn't release numbers, but a friend who works as a municipal engineer figures probably 30-40% by weight of what gets put into recycling ends up going to landfill after being quite expensively sorted, which is at least in part because the city charges more for a larger garbage can but will give you the largest recycling bin with no extra charge, so people end up putting anything that seems "plausibly recyclable" (has ANY glass, plastic, or even wood content, as though somebody's really going to pulp your busted Ikea chair and make paper out of it...) into the blue bins; and 2) the first 100 or so tonnes of compost the city's green bin program created was toxic to plants because of excess sodium and also had to be sent to landfill.

The city of Toronto chooses to take a virtually "anything goes" approach to composting and recycling (although they do have big lists of things that should go in both bins on their website) because they figure it'll increase participation, but there are big processing costs and sometimes serious consequences to not asking people to sort more on their own.

People who are making the point that municipal recycling and composting programs aren't an invitation to continue wholesale thoughtless consumption and feel less guilty about it have it spot on...

Naughty, not necessarily LOL.

I agree the gift wrapper could use ribbon, but check one other thing: are you sure the recipient recycles? Good to know beforehand. I think the main goal should be to look at the entire life cycle of the product. I try to avoid any deforesting paper products, but I make an exception for newspaper (Sunday) and good literature.

Our small New England town has a composting service that accepts meat, paper towels, greasy pizza boxes, dairy, bread, rice, compostable types of cat litter(Yay!) , ash from wood stoves and many other things you can't compost in a home composter. The service costs $100 a year, but you get pretty much as much compost as you want back from the town, as well as good quality composting bins. Between that and a good - and free - recycling program we rarely fill a bag a week of actual garbage.

This is a newish service for us. If your town doesn't offer it, call the Public Works department and request it. Sure, they won't add it just for you, but it's important to make your town government aware of what you, as a citizen, think is important. Who knows - maybe you'll be the 5th or 10th caller that week and it will start someone thinking about it.

Thank you for posting this article. There seems to be a mystique (to me) about what is, and what is not, compostable. The article helps a lot even though I live in a condo complex, I would love to see a community garden and compost area. Since most people here are elderly, they (we) do not have the stamina to do the work. What better place for fresh high quality food than in a community of old people?

If you're doing backyard compost you can avoid some of these items, but my city has a municipal compost system. For example we can put meat in the bins. It gets picked up every two weeks, or every week in the summer, and goes to a facility to be made into compost.

check with your local dump about commercial composter options...we compost most of our scraps here at home- but we take all coated paperboard, napkins, papertowels, meat scraps, kitty litter etc to the dump b/c they can handle it in the commercial composter...

If you want to recycle in your bathroom, please check out the Solecan. We need your support by Earth Day to make this unique attempt to make recycling unavoidable happen.

Every city has different rules. Study carefully what they accept. Go to stores like Whole Foods or some Farmers Markets to recycle what they don't. Always surprise to see in my neighborhood compost bin all the "organics" stickers people don't take out before throwing into the compost bin.

I'm an organic vegetable farmer and have a lot of experience composting. These "rules" about what not to compost are incorrect, unhelpful, and irresponsible. The potential problems can be addressed by properly layering the pile. A simple rule of thumb is: Whenever you add something wet (and nitrogenous) to the pile, cover it thoroughly with something dry (and carbonaceous). If you add meat, cooking oil, dog poo, rice, bread, citrus peels, eggshells, or other "forbidden" materials, just be sure to spread them out across the top of the pile (while still keeping them toward the center), and use an extra generous layer of cover material.

The cover material serves several purposes: Balancing the chemistry of the pile, providing air pockets to ensure aerobic decomposition (as opposed to smelly anaerobic decomposition), and most importantly for a backyard pile: keeping any odors or pests at bay.

For most homeowners, dead leaves are the most practical cover material. At the farm, we use leaves dropped off by the dumpload from the municipality. Our farm is right smack in the middle of a neighborhood, and we have never had complaints about the smell.

It normally takes about a 4'x4' pile to achieve the critical mass necessary for aerobic decomposition. You'll know it's working if the core of the pile heats up. When the temperature starts to decline again, turn the pile (inside-out as much as possible).

Here's a data visualization that takes a closer look at the numbers behind garbage and recycling>> http://flapjackmedia.wordpress.com/2013/02/19/a-closer-look-at-garbage/

I agree with spanner. What Emmi said about not reusing newspaper or paper bags as gift wrappers doesn't make any sense. I just remove all the tape before throwing the rest in the recycling bin! How long does that take???

I agree with spanner. What Emmi said about not reusing newspaper or paper bags as gift wrappers doesn't make any sense. I just remove all the tape before throwing the rest in the recycling bin! How long does that take???
Or using only ribbons (which I reuse over and over too) ! What a great idea...

The list of compostable items is OK for a small-scale home composter. It would be a good idea to mention that.

Most cities in the USA do not have municipal "composting". If someone is using city biowaste recycling through curbside pickup, it is most often done in a bioreactor or anerobic fermenter, which can accommodate most forms of organic waste (including "compostable" diapers). Thus, results may vary. By the way, this process isn't really composting.

The recycling list here mentions some things some folks might not think about, but overall I do have to agree that this isn't a terribly thoughtful or well-researched post.

@tregiani How is it green if you're using tape that's going to get ripped off in ten seconds then thrown in the garbage?

And again - life cycle, people. Life cycle. Do you think the newspaper was dropped out of the sky by Earth fairies?

Yes, this list is not correct for those of us in Portland, Oregon. We can compost all of those things in our curbside service. We can also recycled all paper and freezer/juice boxes in our curbside bin.

Don't forget that you can compost ALL food scraps (bread, meat and dairy included) using a Bokashi Composting System. Anything and everything organic can be put in there - although it's best to be a little careful with anything too wet like oil or milk.

Because the process ferments the waste rather than decomposing it in the normal composting way, the same rules don't apply. I use mine for all kitchen scraps and have not had a problem composting anything (including chicken bones, bread and cheese).

A very good point by e-town from t-town. It's different in every city. In Ottawa, out green bin program accepts everything on the list as well. Check with your local recycling/compose program to see what is accepted!