South Bayside System Authority
Providing wastewater services to residents and businesses inRedwood City, San Carlos, Belmont, and West Bay Sanitary District
SBSA BULLETINSBSA Commission

Summer 2009Manager’s Corner

Jeff Ira Chair
Redwood City Council Member

By Daniel Child, SBSA Manager

Ronald W. Shepherd Vice Chair

Use of Garbage Disposals Has
Positive Impacts on SBSA System

West Bay Sanitary District Member
Robert Grassilli Secretary
San Carlos Council Member
Warren LiebermanT

he use of garbage disposals has positive impacts on the SBSA
wastewater
treatment system. For years disposals have been
Board Member
labeled as being bad, when the truth is, for SBSA, they are very
beneficial and one of the most practical
SBSA Offices
and cost effective ways of recycling.
1400 Radio Road
Food scraps make up approxiRedwood City, CA 94065
mately 30% of the waste that ends up
Phone: 650-591-7121
getting buried at area landfills, which is
Fax: 650-591-7122
why a growing number of wastewater
E-mail: dchild@sbsa.org
treatment facilities are encouraging theuse of garbage disposals and solid
SBSA Staff
waste collectors are urging the public to separate their food wastes for
Daniel T. Child
composting. Some communities, like San Carlos, have begun collectManager
ing food waste with yard waste from single family residents in order toKenneth Kaufman
keep it from landfills.
Technical Services Manager
From the SBSA perspective, using your garbage disposal is benefiLinda Bruemmer
cial for the treatment facility and the environment.
Support Services Manager
The premise behind the proper use of a disposal is to effectively
Andrew Baker
regard food scraps as liquid (averaging 70% water, like human waste),
Operations & Maintenance Managerand utilize existing infrastructure (underground sewers and wastewater
Teresa Herrera
treatment plants) for its management. Modern wastewater plants likeEngineering Manager
SBSA are effective at processing and breaking down the organic solids
Donna Allen
into stabile products (known as biosolids) and capturing methane forEnvironmental Health & Safety
use in co-generation facilities that produce energy and offset theManager
overall cost of power for the treatment process.
In fact, SBSA currently produces about 30% of the power needed
to operate the treatment plant and hopes to increase that amount byencouraging residents to dispose of their food wastes, except cooking
VISIT OUR WEBSITEgrease, through their garbage disposals. You will be seeing more
WWW.SBSA.ORG
information in the local media promoting this practice in the near future.
The wealth of research regarding disposals first and foremost
concludes that municipal sewers and wastewater systems effectivelyBelmont Council Member

SBSA BULLETIN

Page 2treat ground food. Decades of research and widespread use of disposals also support the role the appliances play in diverting food waste from collection trucks, landfills and incinerators – drastically reducing thecarbon footprint of these processes!
Disposals go by many names around the world – garburators in Canada, garbage grinders in Japanare just two examples. But whatever you call them, more than two dozen communities all over the globe
have studied the issue of how using food waste disposals affects sewer systems and the environment, andconcluded that they don‘t harm the former and actually can benefit the latter. These studies are summarized
at: www.insinkerator.com/environmental/wastewater_treatment.shtml and at www.insinkerator.com/pdf/
Summary_of_Research_2006.pdf .
New York City once banned food waste disposals in areas served by combined storm and sanitarysewers. But the City Council directed the city‘s Department of Environmental Protection to conduct a 21month pilot project that studied the impacts of using disposals on the environment, public health and the costof operating the water and sewer system. Among the issues examined were the impact of grease and foodsolids on sewers, the impact on water consumption and the impact of possible increased pollutant loadingon receiving waters. The study concluded that the impact of food waste disposals in any of these areas was“de minimus,” and the previous ban was overturned. Read more here: www.insinkerator.com/pdf/grinders.pdf
For SBSA, there are huge benefits – so from our perspective, use your garbage disposals properly,
and you benefit our operations and the environment!