Waste reduction and composting

Composting is an environmentally friendly way of recycling your kitchen scraps and garden waste and an inexpensive way to provide nutrient-rich compost for your garden. Most of your kitchen scraps can be composted and the rest can go in your food waste bin for collection.

International Composting Week workshops (5 - 11 May)

If you'd like to compost but don't know where to start, sign up to one of the composting workshops below.

They're being run by some of Kingston's wonderful community groups and will be free to attend!

Sunday 5 May 12pm to 1pm
Canbury Community Garden - Composting Workshop: Get tickets.

Saturday 11 May at 11am to 12pm
Hogsmill Community Garden - Wormery & Composting Workshop: Get tickets.

Saturday 11 May at 2pm to 3pm
Kingston Environment Centre - Wormery & Composting Workshop: Get tickets.

Discounted composting bins

We have teamed up with Get Composting to provide residents with reduced-rate compost bins, accessories and water butts that can be delivered to your door. Compost bins cost £22.50 and you can buy one and get another for half price. 

For information on what can and cannot be composted and how to get started, visit Get Composting.

Benefits of composting

The information below is from the Compost Foundation.

• Compost helps maintain healthy plant growth. Soil-enriching composts provide the nutrients necessary for healthy plant growth and intense colors throughout the growing season.
• Save time, money and help save the environment by enriching and amending your soil with compost. Compost helps improve the structure of clay and sandy soils. The organic matter in soil enriched composts helps break up heavy and clay soils making them lighter, freer draining and easier to work.
• Compost will cut down your watering requirements. Using sustainable soil-enriching compost helps prevent erosion of valuable topsoil without depleting valuable wildlife habitats.
• Compost encourages nature to work for you. Earthworms and many other beneficial creatures flourish in enriched soils. Their activities help release essential nutrients, which strengthen plants and increase their resistance to disease.
• Compost helps to quickly establish new shrubs, plants and turf.
• The improved structure of enriched soils provides excellent growing conditions and aids root-zone establishment.
• Composting reduces the amount of food waste sent for processing.
• A blanket of compost used to re-seed land grows vegetation more quickly and more cheaply than other methods.