Unlike traditional plastic bags and other single-use plastic items that last for decades in landfills, EcoSafe’s compostable products are strong like traditional plastic – yet - when disposed of in a commercial compost facility, the material will decompose within 10 – 45 days depending on the type of composting technology being used.
Composting facilities can take 2-6 months to fully compost organic matter. Commercial compost facilities send our collected bags/products along with other food scraps and organic matter through a grinder that partially disintegrates material to speed up the composting process. A feedstock mixture of carbon materials (brown items such as lawn waste) and nitrogen materials (green items such as food scraps and our bags) are full of microorganisms that give off enzymes to break down all of the material. Commercial compost facilities apply high heat in an intense composting phase that generally lasts 3-6 weeks to sanitize and break down most of the organic material. This composting stage is where most facilities vary in their process.
Finally, all compost must undergo a curing process that reduces heat and finalizes material breakdown, lasting 2-4 months depending on the composting process. At the end of the composting process, our compostable bags/products have broken down into nothing but water, a small amount of CO2 (this is produced by all food or products in the composting process), and humus (a nutrient-rich organic material).