Michelle Horneff-Cohen
Every April, Earth Day brings a familiar message: reduce waste, compost more, do your part. And to be fair, it works at least on the surface. Awareness goes up. Conversations happen. People become more intentional, if only for a moment, about what they throw away. But then something predictable happens. The momentum fades. The compost bin sits unused. Food scraps find their way back into the landfill.
Not because people don鈥檛 care. And not because they don鈥檛 understand what to do. But because the system they鈥檙e being asked to participate in doesn鈥檛 fully account for how they actually live. That鈥檚 the part Earth Day gets wrong.
If composting were simply a knowledge issue, we would have solved it by now. Most households already know the basics. They鈥檝e seen the guides, read the lists, and understand that food scraps can and should be diverted from landfills and turned into something beneficial. Municipal programs have expanded. Infrastructure has improved. Messaging is everywhere.
And yet, participation remains inconsistent. Contamination persists. Drop-off rates fluctuate. The gap between intention and action is still there. The industry has responded the way it always does, more education, more outreach, more reminders about what goes where. But what if the issue isn鈥檛 what people know? What if it鈥檚 what they experience?
The Step We Keep Overlooking
Composting is often framed as a system that begins at the curb or in the backyard. Bins, carts, and collection schedules define the process. But in reality, composting begins much earlier. It begins on the kitchen counter.
That鈥檚 where food waste is generated, throughout the day, in small, inconsistent moments. A banana peel here. Coffee grounds there. Vegetable trimmings during dinner prep. Leftovers scraped from a plate after a long day.
These aren鈥檛 big, deliberate actions. They鈥檙e routine. Habitual. Easy to overlook. And that鈥檚 exactly why they matter. Because if capturing those moments feels inconvenient, even slightly, they won鈥檛 happen.
Friction Is the Real Barrier
The challenge with composting isn鈥檛 that it鈥檚 difficult in theory. It鈥檚 that it introduces friction into routines that are otherwise effortless. Throwing something in the trash is immediate. It鈥檚 familiar. It requires no additional thought. Composting, on the other hand, often asks for more.
More steps. More handling. More maintenance. A container that needs to be cleaned. A liner that needs to be replaced. Odor that needs to be managed. A sometimes icky process that doesn鈥檛 quite fit into the rhythm of the kitchen.
Individually, these may seem minor. Collectively, they鈥檙e enough to break consistency. And once consistency breaks, participation follows.
Infrastructure Can鈥檛 Solve a Behavior Problem
Municipalities have made significant investments in composting infrastructure, and rightly so. Collection programs, processing facilities, and policy mandates are all essential pieces of the system. Without them, large-scale diversion wouldn鈥檛 be possible.
But infrastructure alone doesn鈥檛 guarantee participation. You can provide every household with a bin. You can establish reliable pickup. You can enforce compliance through policy.
None of that ensures that food scraps actually make it out of the kitchen. Because infrastructure operates at the system level. Participation happens at the human level. And the two don鈥檛 always align.
Design the Missing Link
This is where the conversation needs to shift. Not toward more awareness. Not toward stricter enforcement. But toward design.
Not design in the aesthetic sense, but in the functional, everyday sense. The kind that considers how people move through their routines, what they tolerate, and what they avoid. The most effective systems aren鈥檛 the ones that demand behavior change. They鈥檙e the ones that quietly support it.
They reduce friction instead of adding to it. They fit into existing habits instead of trying to replace them. They make the right action the easiest one. In composting, that means rethinking the experience at the point where it actually begins.
The Kitchen Is the System
It鈥檚 easy to think of composting as something that happens outside at the curb, in a bin, or at a facility. But the reality is simpler. If the process doesn鈥檛 work in the kitchen, it doesn鈥檛 work at all. Because that鈥檚 where the decision is made, not once, but repeatedly, throughout the day:
- Do I separate this or not?
- Do I deal with this now or later?
- Is this easy, or is it a hassle?
These decisions don鈥檛 feel significant in the moment. But over time, they define participation. And participation is what determines whether composting programs succeed or struggle.
Rethinking the Goal
Earth Day does an excellent job of reminding people why composting matters. But it often stops there. It assumes that awareness naturally leads to action, that once people understand the environmental impact, they will adjust their behavior accordingly. Sometimes they do. Often, they don鈥檛.
Not because they鈥檙e unwilling, but because the system hasn鈥檛 been designed with their reality in mind. If the goal is to increase participation, then the focus needs to shift, from educating people about composting to making composting easier to actually do. That鈥檚 a very different challenge. And it requires a different kind of thinking. Earth Day doesn鈥檛 need more messaging. It needs more honesty.
Honesty about where systems fall short. About why good intentions don鈥檛 always translate into action. About the small, everyday barriers that prevent people from doing what they already know is right. Because once those barriers are acknowledged, they can be addressed. And when they鈥檙e addressed, participation doesn鈥檛 have to be forced. It becomes natural.
A Different Way Forward
The future of composting won鈥檛 be defined by how many people are told to do it. It will be defined by how many people can do it consistently, without thinking twice.
That shift won鈥檛 come from bigger campaigns or better slogans. It will come from better systems. Systems that recognize that composting doesn鈥檛 start at the curb.
It starts at the counter. And if that first step works, if it fits seamlessly into everyday life, everything that follows becomes easier:
- Collection improves.
- Contamination drops.
- Participation grows.
Not because people were convinced, but because the system finally made sense.
Earth Day has always been about possibility, the idea that small actions, taken collectively, can create meaningful change. That idea still holds. But for composting to truly scale, those small actions have to be realistic. They have to fit into daily life, not sit outside of it.
Because the most important step in composting isn鈥檛 the one at the curb. It鈥檚 the one that happens long before that quietly, repeatedly, in the kitchen. And until that step works, the rest of the system never fully will.