PITTSFIELD, Mass. — Dozens of Berkshire businesses and institutions are among the 1,700 statewide being mandated to reduce, reuse and recycle their food waste.
As of Wednesday, supermarkets, restaurants, hospitals, colleges, resorts and other commercial entities that generate at least one ton of organic material per week must separate it from their regular solid waste, according the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection.
MassDEP officials report that 1,400 of the 1,700 businesses affected by the disposal ban had already taken the steps to have food waste composted, brought to farms as animal feed and/or donated to food banks, if it remains consumable. Food waste also can be sent to an anaerobic digestion facility, such as the one at Pine Island Farm in Sheffield, where it can be converted to electricity and other clean energy.
The 82 percent compliance rate indicates the stricter food waste disposal regulations -- five years in the making -- have been an opportunity for businesses and institutions to get a head start turning trash into cash, according to MassDEP Commissioner David Cash.
"The whole point of the one-ton threshold, on balance, is going to represent a cost savings," Cash said in an Eagle phone interview. "We generate 1.3 million tons of food waste each year, more than 25 percent of all waste [in Massachusetts] -- enough to fill 20 Fenway Parks."
The Eagle surveyed some of the county's largest employers and found supermarket chains and large lodgings typically fell under the new regulations.
Nevertheless, all who spoke to The Eagle said they have implemented or have expanded plans to reduce or remove unused food from the general waste stream.
In March, Canyon Ranch of the Berkshires in Lenox hired a food waste company to haul away for composting its 1 to 2 tons of organic material produced weekly.
"It's increased