What’s the Dirt on Composting? An Exploration on Improving Personal Composting for Residents Living in Downtown Toronto High Rises

Composting is an effective way for anyone to divert their organic waste from landfills. Unfortunately, in high density cities, such as Toronto, composting rates can be as low as 22% (Government of Canada, 2015). This is an opportunity to make a positive impact on the planet while making a simple change. The literature that supports improving composting is focusing on how compost works and what can be done to improve the process, how education and convenience plays a role, and can design thinking help solve improving composting by approaching the problem as a design problem. This study asks residents living in downtown Toronto what their composting habits are like whether they compost. First the participants were given a survey then had a follow up interview that would give a deeper understanding to how composting can be a challenge and how they feel it can be improved. The common theme among the participants was they needed better education on what goes in the composting bin, transparency with how the city handles the compost waste, and improving convenience of the compost waste disposal. A proposed solution is an app that helps the user compost despite whatever their current situation is. For example, if a user does not know what goes in their compost bin, the app will clearly list what goes in the bin depending on what region they live in.