Compost is decomposed organic material, such as leaves, grass clippings and kitchen waste. It provides many essential nutrients for plant growth and therefore is often used as a fertilizer. As a result of an initiative organized by our Students for Sustainability Club, our campus began collecting compostable food waste which is turned into compost used in the campus landscape.

The videos below share details about how compost is created and how our student-run composting initiative is run. Beginning in Fall 2017, members of the Students for Sustainability Club travel across campus each week to pick up food compost from various faculty and staff lounges and offices. They gather and deliver the compostable food to the Peiffer Farm where the compostable items are dumped into a food compost barrel purchased by the club.

The “food compost route” currently includes seven locations spread across the Thun Library and the Gaige, Franco and Luerssen buildings. If you’re interested in adding a location to the pick up route, please contact: Dr. Mahsa Kazempour, at muk30@psu.edu. Our campus Cyber Café and Tully’s have joined in on the composting action. Used coffee grounds are now transported to Peiffer Farm for composting purposes. This reduces the amount of resources sent to the landfills from food waste.