The good news is that the company was very good about working with the university and was in the process of exchanging the dry composter for a wet composting system. “It only uses five to ten gallons of water a day, and what comes out goes through a grease interceptor, where all of our waste water goes,” Meyer says.

So, all in all, a good outcome, although Meyer says he is disappointed that there will be no dry compost.

What goals should we have?

Meyer has a goal of eventually composting “virtually everything,” he says. Part of the goal is eventually to have all compostable disposables.

Testing, talking to experts and reaching out to the community are all ways to advance composting to that next stage: truly sustainable, fiscally sound and good for the environment.

What many point to as the next step for a true composting movement is developing an efficient route.

Each route should have an “anchor,” a large operation — such as a hospital or college — that can generate 4 or 5 tons or more a week of food waste, says Michael Manna, managing director of Organic Recycling Solutions, a national resource developer.

Manna has spent more than 20 years developing routes between generators of food waste and compost facilities, helping the compost facilities develop “milk runs” with maybe ten stops.

How do I get customers to use the correct bins?

It can be difficult to expect customers — often harried or just not in-the-know — to place their compostable food waste in one place, their recyclables and reusables in another.

Dan Henroid of the University of California-San Francisco Medical Center, puts it more bluntly: “If you are relying on customers to do the sorting for you, good luck.”

Before composting went into full swing at the medical center about two years ago, Henroid, director of the Department of Nutrition and Medical Services, observed many different operations, including a few different B&I operations, and the university's student union, which is just across the street from the medical center.

“People either don't know, don't care, or they're too hurried,” Henroid says. “There are a million different reasons. The most successful composting operations we saw were ones that did their own sorting.”

Why is sorting so important? “Because our waste hauler doesn't want ‘dirty compost.’ They will stop picking it up if there are too many instances of non-compostable materials getting in,” Henroid says. He even goes so far as to keep the compost bin under lock and key so no one accidentally throws something in that doesn't belong.

The key in “keeping our compost clean,” Henroid says, has been educational programs for staff where they learn — for this particular operation — what is compostable and what isn't.

“The biggest challenge is getting people to put the right stuff in the right bins,” agrees Mark Eggleston, director of hospitality services, Overlake Hospital Medical Center, Bellevue, WA. “So our dish room people sort it, and luckily, we have a program with the Bellevue school district and mentally disabled people volunteer to sort compostable materials for the cafeteria. They do a really good job.”

Overlake Hospital Medical Center composts all kitchen scraps and any compostable disposables. Since they began, King County has mandated composting, and the Seattle-based Starbucks provides the center with compostable cups that also bear the Starbucks logo, “killing two birds with one stone,” Eggleston says.

However, that doesn't mean that customers are completely unable to sort. At Iowa State, Levandowski has found that “students, in particular, are very green-savvy and they typically follow through on their end of the deal and properly dispose of everything on their plate.” Levandowski credits education efforts in the form of posters, tours and student media to get the message out.

How do I let customers and the community know what I'm doing?

Just as untold numbers of customers are starting to demand green practices and transparency (especially on college campuses), many are becoming leery about ‘greenwashing,’ a term used to describe companies that promote themselves as being sustainable mostly for a marketing benefit without being true to the philosophy. Creating a composting system that works should be top-of-mind. Then, marketing and getting the word out can be pursued.

Jeanne Fry, director of foodservices at the University of Georgia, says UGA foodservice is typically very good at telling their story, but had fallen a little bit short when it came to green practices. She was able to turn that around, and was even awarded the title of Green Champion by the Go Green Alliance on campus.

Although UGA dining had been a pioneer in pulping waste, is just starting a new composting program. “We are going to have dedicated bins on the dock at Joe Frank Harris Commons, a building that houses the Village Summit, one of our meal-plan facilities, the commissary kitchen for all retail outlets and also has the Red Clay Café food mart and the Village Market c-store,” Fry says.

The university's physical plant will pick up the food waste three times a week and take it to the university's composting facility, located just outside the city.

Getting all the university departments together was a challenge. “They had the composting, we had the materials,” Fry says. “The Go Green Alliance was formed, and they campaigned to have a student fee that would create the Office of Sustainability a couple years ago. They are addressing all kinds of issues on campus, and composting was definitely one.”

“I helped them out during Earth Week. They wanted to do a catered reception after campus tours that was a totally no-waste, locally grown event,” Fry says. “I jumped through the hoops and found as much local food as I could during a week in April (there wasn't much). We did it all on china, provided a composting bin for scraps and we used compostable napkins.”

Fry says students weren't even aware of many things the campus foodservice department had already been doing — like recycling since the 1970s, pulping, having Second Harvest pick up leftovers for homeless and battered women's shelters, and water conservation.

“My advice to schools is to ask yourself three questions: ‘What are we already doing that our students don't know about?’ ‘What else can we easily do immediately with little or no investment?’ And ‘How can we work green initiatives into our future projects?’ Then make sure your campus and community are aware of your efforts.”

Giampa at Phillips says during big events like commencement and reunions, he strives for a fully sustainable event.

“When we have the opening of school and we have the parent-student welcome, it's 2,000 to 3,000 people. We set up the menu to be a sustainable success. No more bags of chips, no more plastic plates & forks. Once you get used to it, it's pretty easy,” he says, adding that there will be blurbs about sustainability in the commencement packet for parents.