Compost – It’s even better than you think!

It’s fantastic!

Compost helps retain water, improves drainage, and encourages worms and helpful micro-flora and fauna to colonise your garden beds.

If you make compost at home with garden waste and kitchen scraps it’s not only free but it contributes significantly to improving the health of our environment! This is because gases are produced when organic material, such as grass clippings, leaves and food scraps are decomposing. If the organic material is decomposed in a well-managed, aerated (plenty of air circulating) compost heap or bin, healthy compost will be made and the gas produced will be carbon dioxide. However, if the kitchen and garden waste is sitting in an anaerobic (no oxygen), soggy compost bin, or buried in a landfill, it will decay to produce methane gas and a smelly sludge is produced.

Both methane and carbon dioxide are greenhouse gases, but methane has a Global Warming Potential of 21 times that of carbon dioxide. The Australian Greenhouse Office states "food or garden waste that breaks down with no fresh air generates three to four times more greenhouse gas than it would if it decayed in the presence of air – aerobically."

The decay of a family's food and garden waste generates almost one tonne of greenhouse gas each year. Domestic wastes in landfill contribute 6% of greenhouse gases- this is more than the common target for reducing greenhouse emissions- lighting our homes (4%) and nearly as much as heating and cooling our houses (8%).

By composting our own garden and kitchen wastes in an aerated compost heap or bin, the carbon dioxide that is produced will be less harmful to the environment than the methane that would be generated from that same waste going to landfill.

For more information refer to our other helpful information sheets on Natural Soil Improvers and The Science of Composting.

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