Waste Management xxx (2016) xxx–xxx

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Waste Management
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/wasman

Environmental and economic analysis of an in-vessel food waste

composting system at Kean University in the U.S.
Dongyan Mu a,⇑, Naomi Horowitz a, Maeve Casey b, Kimmera Jones b
a
School of Environmental and Sustainability Science, Kean University, 1000 Morris Ave., Union 07083, NJ, United States
b
Union County Vocational Technology High School, NJ 1776 Raritan Rd, Scotch Plains, NJ 07076, United States

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: A composting system provides many benefits towards achieving sustainability such as, replacing fertil-
Received 9 May 2016 izer use, increasing the quantity of produce sold, and diverting organic wastes from landfills. This study
Revised 13 October 2016 delves into the many benefits a composting system provided by utilizing an established composting sys-
Accepted 20 October 2016
tem at Kean University (KU) in New Jersey, as a scale project to examine the composters’ environmental
Available online xxxx
and economic impacts. The results from the study showed that composting food wastes in an in-vessel
composter when compared to typical disposal means by landfilling, had lower impacts in the categories
Keywords:
of fossil fuel, GHG emissions, eutrophication, smog formation and respiratory effects; whereas, its had
Food wastes recycle and reuse
In-vessel composting
higher impacts in ozone depletion, acidification human health impacts, and ecotoxicity. The environmen-
Life cycle assessment tal impacts were mainly raised from the manufacturing of the composter and the electricity use for oper-
Cost-benefit analysis ation. Applying compost to the garden can replace fertilizers and also lock carbon and nutrients in soil,
which reduced all of the environmental impact categories examined. In particular, the plant growth
and use stage reduced up to 80% of respiratory effects in the life cycle of food waste composting. A
cost-benefit analysis showed that the composting system could generate a profit of $13,200 a year by
selling vegetables grown with compost to the student cafeteria at Kean and to local communities.
When educational and environmental benefits were included in the analysis, the revenue increased to
$23,550. The results suggest that in-vessel composting and the subsequent usage of a vegetable garden
should be utilized by Universities or food markets that generate intensive food wastes across the U.S.
Published by Elsevier Ltd.

1. Introduction
According to the report by the Natural Resources Defense Coun-
cil 2012 (Gunders, 2012), ‘‘getting food to our tables eats up 10
percent of the total U.S. energy budget, uses 50 percent of U.S. land,
and swallows 80 percent of freshwater consumed in the United
States. Yet, 40 percent of food in the United States today goes
uneaten. . .” and more than 95 percent of food waste ends up in
landfills (US EPA, 2014b). The egregious amount of food waste
has raised concerns not only about the waste of energy and
resources to produce the food, but also over the disposal of the
food in landfills, because the food waste in landfills breakdowns
Abbreviations: AASLAB, Agricultural Analytical Services Laboratory; CFC, chlo-
rofluorocarbon; EPA, environmental protection agency; EU, eutrophication; FM,
fresh matter; GHG, greenhouse gas; GWP, global warming potential; ISO, Interna-
tional Standard Organization; KU, Kean University; LCA, life cycle assessment; LCI,
life cycle inventory; LCIA, life cycle impact analysis; PM, particulate matter.
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: dmu@kean.edu (D. Mu).
and releases methane (CH4), a much more potent greenhouse gas
(GHG) than carbon dioxide (CO2). Currently, landfills have become
the third largest source of CH4 emissions in the United States and
have accounted for 18% of the total methane emissions there (US
EPA, 2015).
Many researchers have proposed diverting food waste from
landfills as a solution to reduce CH4 emissions in the United States.
Amongst all of the diverting technologies, composting is the
method recommended the most, because it is able to reduce waste
disposal in landfills, while simultaneously recycling organic mate-
rials by converting them into a beneficial product. In the compost-
ing process, organics decompose and stabilize in an aerobic
condition. The final product, compost, can be used as a soil amend-
ment that improves soil texture and fertility and thus reduces the
use of synthetic fertilizers applied to the soil (US EPA, 2009). In
addition to the usage of compost as a fertilizer, applying compost
to the soil may increase the carbon storage capacity within the soil,
which reduces GHG emissions into the atmosphere (Saer et al.,
2013). Composting is also superior to other food waste recycling

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2016.10.026
0956-053X/Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Please cite this article in press as: Mu, D., et al. Environmental and economic analysis of an in-vessel food waste composting system at Kean University in
the U.S.. Waste Management (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2016.10.026
2 D. Mu et al. / Waste Management xxx (2016) xxx–xxx
technologies, such as anaerobic digestion and incineration, because
it is easier to start and manage (US EPA, 2009), has better economic
performance at a small scale (Murphy and Power, 2006), produces
safer by-products, and releases less GHG emissions (Andersen
et al., 2011).
Despite many benefits, the application of food waste compost-
ing remains low, i.e., only 8.3% of 36 million tons of food waste
generated were recycled in 2011 (US EPA, 2014b). The concen-
trated food waste composting is even rare in the U.S. and is faced
with many challenges, including (1) the food waste is created every
day and easy to become putrid, which increases household’s and
waste management companies’ workload on food wastes collec-
tion and sorting; (2) composting facilities find it difficult to dis-
cover end users to utilize the compost, and thus cannot make
revenue by selling it to offset operating costs (Murphy and
Power, 2006); (3) some composting technologies, such as Wind-
row, operate in open air, with feedstocks and operating conditions
varying greatly in seasons and weather as a result the product
quality is difficult to control; (4) the exhaust with its unpleasant
odor can arouse objection in local communities.
In order to promote food waste recycling, Kean University (KU)
initiated a composting project by establishing a composter at its
Union campus (shown in Fig. 1). The composting project addressed
current challenges in composting by making several significant
improvements in the composting system design.
Firstly, instead of utilizing the popular windrow or tunneled
composter, Kean University established an in-vessel composter
where food waste decomposes in a rotary vessel with steel. As a
result, the KU composter uses much less land and can accommo-
date a wide variety of organic wastes (US EPA, 2016). This in-
vessel composter also allows a relatively flexible residence time,
ranging from a few days to weeks, and well-controlled operating
conditions (Cabaraban et al., 2008) even in extremely cold weather.
Secondly, the composter has the capacity to treat 1000 lbs of
food scraps per day. The high treating capacity is larger than many
existing in-vessel composters at other Universities. The expecta-
tion is that this large-scale application will treat more food scraps,
Fig. 1. KU composter and vegetable growing in soil with compost. (a) KU in-vessel composter. (b) Compost produced. (c) Sprouted seeds. (d) Harvest vegetables (30 days). (e)
Vegetable samples sent to AASLAB.
Please cite this article in press as: Mu, D., et al. Environmental and economic analysis of an in-vessel food waste composting system at Kean University in
the U.S.. Waste Management (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2016.10.026
and thus lower down operation costs per unit input and obtain
more disposal cost offsets.
Lastly, an end user utilizes the compost product. The end user at
KU is a 6-acre plant farm that provides vegetables and herbs to the
student dining halls and a farm-to-table restaurant at KU. The
farm, dining hall, restaurant, and composter, form a closed-loop
life cycle in food production, consumption, and waste treatment,
since no food waste is disposed of in landfills.
The KU composter also serves as an education center. Many stu-
dents have visited the facility as part of a teaching lesson, or during
the college’s Open Day held once a year to welcome incoming
freshmen. The university uses the composting project to demon-
strate efforts in greening the university for both the students and
the public. The composting system also provides internship/part-
time job opportunities to students. Students are hired part-time
to work in the composter and grow produce at the KU’s Liberty Hall
Farm during the growing season. This enables the students to col-
lect real life experience in the field of sustainable technology and
allows them to practice sills in facility operating.
Although many benefits have been identified for KU’s com-
poster, an analysis on environmental and economic performance
has not been conducted so far. In particular, the benefits created
from setting up a closed loop in food waste treatment had not been
previously evaluated. The current knowledge gaps were mainly in
three areas. First, the emissions from the in-vessel composting had
not been tested; therefore, the full inventory of emissions could
not be established. Second, analyses of the vegetable garden’s
yields have not been conducted, and thus incomes by applying
compost could not be estimated. Third, there were indirect social
and environmental benefits due to the food waste reduction on
campus and diversion of organics from landfills, which were diffi-
cult to estimate.
This study aimed at filling in the knowledge gap for KU’s com-
posting system, and focused on conducting life cycle assessment
and cost-benefits analysis to evaluate environmental and eco-
nomic impacts. In order to determine the vegetable yields when
compost is used, researchers conducted a vegetable growing
 D. Mu et al. / Waste Management xxx (2016) xxx–xxx
experiment and nutrient analysis in compost, soil and vegetables.
The results from the vegetable growing experiment were then
applied in LCA and cost-benefit analysis. Current studies for com-
posting technologies were reviewed, as shown in Tables 1 and 2,
which provided information and estimates of process emissions
and discharges. The environmental impacts of food waste com-
posting were compared with disposing them in landfills. The indi-
rect educational and environmental benefits were also included in
the cost-benefit analysis. The end of the study described the envi-
ronmental and economic impacts by applying similar composting
systems to colleges and universities across the U.S.
The study was expected to facilitate an in-depth understanding
of in-vessel composting technology, especially given that research
regarding this technology was limited in current literature. In addi-
tion, this study considered and included the end users of the veg-
etables (i.e., the restaurant and the student dining hall) into the
economic analysis, which was barely represented in the existing
literature. As a result, the expansion of the scope provided a holis-
tic analysis of composting technology. The knowledge gained
about the system in this study may promote the development of
composting technology, prove the feasibility of installation, and
thus motivate application of composters in large food waste pro-
ducers like universities and groceries stores.
2. Methodology
2.1. Description of the food waste composting system
2.1.1. Food wastes for composting
Kean University (KU) is the third largest university in the state,
containing approximately 17,000 students. Food wastes, both pre-
and post-consumer, generated at KU, amounts to almost 50 tons
per year, 39.2 tons of which are organics (Manna, 2009). The large
amount of food waste provides sufficient and no cost feedstock to
run an industrial scale composter. The food scraps are collected
primarily from the student dining halls and range from proteins,
fruits, vegetables, grains, seafood, and bones (Goldstein, 2013).
Most of the food waste decomposes easily in the composter.
Additionally, wood chips are also fed into the composter in
order to raise the C:N ratio, because the compost emits an unpleas-
ant odor if the C:N ratio is not in the appropriate range. The ratio of
food scraps to wood chips is approximately 4:1 by weight. A local
woodworking business provides the wood chips at no cost. This
allows for both KU and the woodworking business to divert the
wood chips from the landfills.
2.1.2. Composter and composting
The composter was designed to hold a capacity of 1000 lbs
(450 kg) of food scraps and an additional 250 lbs (125 kg) of wood
chips per day. The current average residence time is about 5 days.
The off-loaded compost is up to 450 kg (around one cubic yard) per
day. This means that for every 575 kg of food wastes and wood
Table 1
Current LCA studies of composting systems.
Literature Feedstock Composter
Saer et al. (2013) Organic wastes Windrow
Martinez-Blanco et al. (2010) Organic MSW Windrow
Cadena et al. (2009) Organic MSW Tunnels Windrow
Lundie and Peters (2005) Food wastes
van Haaren et al. (2010) Yard wastes Windrow
Amlinger et al. (2008) Green wastes Sewage sludge Windrow
van Haaren (2009) Yard wastes Food waste In-vessel
Cabaraban et al. (2008) Yard, food and paper wastes In-vessel
Please cite this article in press as: Mu, D., et al. Environmental and economic analysis of an in-vessel food waste composting system at Kean University in
the U.S.. Waste Management (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2016.10.026
3
chips fed into the composter, 125 kg of mass is lost as various
emissions to the atmosphere.
Since the student cafeteria stop running during the summer and
winter break, the composter only operates 8 months/32 weeks a
year. During the operating season, the food scraps arriving from
the student cafeterias are weighed and added into the composter
everyday. The quantity of food scraps added could vary every
day, but has to be lower than the design limit (450 kg). Along with
the food scraps, the wood chips (25% of the food scraps’ weight) are
added. Compost is extracted out of the composter every day with
the same quantity of food scraps added.
The ammonium content in compost taken right out of the com-
poster is too high to grow plants. Therefore, the compost must to
be plied for at least 20 days to further decompose before it can
be applied on the soil at Liberty Hall Farm at KU. During the stage
where the compost decomposes further, the compost continuously
loses mass as emissions to the air. The piled up stage is more closed
to the Windrow composting. The total weight loss from fresh food
scraps to compost for land use is between 50% and 70%, depending
on the amount of time allotted.
The energy use to compost was mainly for food scrapes shred-
ding, and composter aeration and rotation. Aeration occurs approx-
imately every 15 min, and rotation of the composter occurs hourly.
All the operations are conducted automatically with the exception
of weighing the food scraps and wood chips, adding the feedstocks
and extracting the compost.
2.1.3. Growing vegetables
A key benefit of compost is that the compost is able to nourish
the campus landscape and reduce the environmental impacts that
would have been needed to produce the fertilizer. Currently, a
majority of compost produced in the composter is sent to the Lib-
erty Hall Farm, an organic farm located at the Kean Union campus.
Various plants and vegetables are grown there and provided to a
high-end restaurant or student cafeterias on campus, or sold to
local communities. Locally grown food at Liberty Hall Farm dis-
places energy, resources and emissions for vegetable production
in other farms as well. In addition, because the food from the com-
post is qualified as organic food with higher marginal values, more
revenue can be obtained by selling the produce.
2.2. Vegetable growing test
Since plants grown in a combination of soil and compost pro-
duced from the KU composter had not been examined before, the
life cycle assessment and economic analysis could not be con-
ducted. Therefore, the study conducted a primary test on plant-
growth first in order to examine how nutrients in compost were
able to grow vegetables and what the quality was for vegetables
grown with compost. The information collected was used to calcu-
late the fertilizer replacement and incomes by selling vegetables
nourished by compost.
Capacity Scope
t/day
0.9 Waste collection, composting, and compost use in soil
41 Waste collection, composting, and using for growing tomatoes
16.4 Composting
136 Waste collection, composting
1 Waste collection, composting, and using compost in soil
0.087 Composting
Waste collection, composting
1 Collection and composting
4 D. Mu et al. / Waste Management xxx (2016) xxx–xxx

Table 2
Current economic studies of composting systems.

Literature Feedstock Composter Capacity Costs

ton(s)/year $/ton
Van Haaren (2009) Yard wastes; food wastes In-vessel 40,000 147
Windrow 21
Gore-cover 42
Cabaraban et al. (2008) Yard waste; food waste In-vessel 453
Fabian et al. (1993) Manure Windrow 52,531 2.2
CM Consulting (2007) Food waste 81.8
Davitt (2005) Organic MSW Windrow 12 49.3
Beattie (2014) Food wastes Windrow 0.1 36.2

A vegetable, Taiwanese Pai Tsai, was grown in garden soil com-
bined with compost at 0%, 5%, and 10% (v/v) mixing rates. In addi-
tion, the soil contained commercialized synthetic fertilizers/plant
foods (0.025 g fertilizer/100 g soil), which is recommended by
the suppler. Taiwanese Pai Tsai is a popular vegetable for Chinese
people. This vegetable was chosen because it is easy to grow, has
a short harvest time (14–25 days), high yield (500–1500 kg/cycle/
acre), and relatively high market price ($1.99/lbs). The fertilizers
used were bought from a grocery store and included nitrogen
(N), phosphorus (P), and potassium (K) in it. Characteristics of
the pure soil, compost, and fertilizer are listed in Table 3.
The vegetable was planted on August 16th, 2015, with five
seeds in each of the four potted soil conditions, as shown in
Fig. 1. All the pots were put outside and watered with 50 mL/-
day/pot of tap water every morning, with the extra water flowing
out of the pots. The plant growth showed that seeds sprouted
within one week. The compost did not help immensely with veg-
etable sprouting because there was no difference observed among
the four samples in this stage. The vegetable was collected after
30 days on September 15th, weighed, and sent out to AASLAB for
Plant Tissue Analysis. The average plant harvest and nutrient con-
tents of the four samples are shown in Table 4. The results show
that plants growing with synthetic fertilizers had more than twice
the N content than plants growing with compost. The study con-
sidered this difference when calculating fertilizer replacement.
The sample of 5% compost combination yielded the most vegeta-
bles. The average vegetable weight was 5 g per plant.
The annual plant yields from applying compost were estimated
based on the vegetable growth in soil with 5% mixing ratio of com-
post from the in-vessel composting. The total food waste was mod-
eled with 39.2 ton (78,400 lbs) generated in eight months
(32 weeks) each year. The designed feeding rate was 450 kg com-
bined with 125 kg of wood chips, which produced 169.5 kg of com-
post with 70% of weight loss of inputs. Therefore, across the entire
year, the compost produced would be 13,300 kg with 332 kg N,
30 kg P, and 85 kg K available to be added to soil. The study
assumed all the nutrients from the compost were able to be taken
up by plants and all nutrients in plants were derived from nutri-
ents in compost. Since the plants grown in 5% combination ratio
have N, P and K contents of 2.6%, 0.8% and 7.14%, the maximum
yield was 1200 kg per year. In this case, the K in compost was
depleted but there was a surplus of N and P.
2.3. Life cycle assessment (LCA)
2.3.1. Goal and scope
The study used LCA as a tool to examine the environmental per-
formance of food waste composting at a university campus. The
LCA followed the ISO 14000 standards. The scope of the LCA cov-
ered entire life cycle stages from waste collection all the way to
the produce consumers, shown in Fig. 2. The functional unit was
the per tonne fresh matter (FM) in food wastes treated in the KU
composter. The environmental impacts of composting were also
compared to waste disposed in a landfill equipped with leachate
and gas collection systems.
2.3.2. Life cycle inventory (LCI)
The study established the LCI for composting food wastes by
analyzing the material and energy flows of unit processes inte-
grated with existing LCA databases and literatures. The LCI
included direct airborne pollutants, i.e., CO2, CH4, N2O, NOx, NH3,
and waterborne pollutants, i.e., N and P discharged in the life cycle.
The LCI also accounted indirect emissions or pollutants from
energy generation, fertilizer production and composter manufac-
turing. Other impacts were not included in the analysis. All
assumptions for process modeling and LCI establishing are listed
in Table 5. A detailed description of each stage in the composting
life cycle is included in Supporting Information (SI).
Currently, the food wastes for the KU composter are pre-
consumer wastes that are discarded before the consumer use stage,
because the compost is going to meet the requirement of organic
farms and using post-consumer waste increases the potential to
contaminate the compost. Since the quantity of food waste varies
daily, the likeliest carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) contents were
applied in LCI. The composition of bulking material, such as pine
tree woodchips, was based on data in existing literature. The wood
chips were combined with food wastes with a ratio of 1:4. The
compositions of food wastes and woodchips were used to calculate
C and N lost in composting. The impact in food wastes collection
was minimal, as no machine or fuels were used for collection.
Therefore, the study only accounted for the impacts in wood chips
transportation, because they were collected outside the University.
Four truck deliveries of 500 lbs (227 kg) of wood chips are utilized
to compost. The distance is 0.8 km from the wood working plant to
Kean University in Union, New Jersey.

Table 3
Nutrients composition of soil, compost and fertilizer for vegetable growing.

C TNa NH3 NO3 P K

% % ppm ppm ppm ppm
Pure soil 1.7 0.1 3.0 – 189.0 137.9
Compost 45.1 2.5 3699.0 1.0 2227.1 6416.7
Fertilizer – 12.0 27000.0 20000.0 17467.2 66666.7
a
TN, total nitrogen.

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 D. Mu et al. / Waste Management xxx (2016) xxx–xxx 5

Table 4
Vegetable nutrient analysis.

Nutrients content #1 #2 #3 #4
Pure coil 5% compost 10% compost Syn Fer
%* %* %*
N% 2.48
58.61 2.66
55.69 2.82
53.05 6.00
P% 0.63 55.72 0.80 99.08 0.79 94.60 0.40
K% 6.16
15.60 7.14
2.25 8.32 13.96 7.30
Ca% 2.89 4.25 3.97 43.07 2.46
11.38 2.77
Mg% 0.57
17.47 0.45
34.31 0.46
32.78 0.69
S% 1.46 7.92 1.37 1.86 1.83 36.05 1.35
Mn ppm 248
81.43 37
97.24 28
97.91 1333
Fe ppm 455
21.61 154
73.41 215
63.05 581
Cu ppm 62
35.54 31
67.72 27
71.26 95
B ppm 42
4.84 41
6.65 49 12.38 44
Al ppm 345
19.42 101
76.54 137
68.11 429
Zn ppm 323
66.51 85
91.15 74
92.35 966
Na ppm 8901 48.22 4534
24.50 7055 17.48 6005
Avg. weight/plant g 2
50 5 25 3
25 4

The underline means the highest value in each nutrient category.

a
Percentage difference from plants with synthetic fertilizer, (
) means lower than the synthetic fertilizer scenario.

Waste
transportation
to landfills

Fertilizer
Vegetables

production

Transporta

Compost
Feedstock
transportation

Facility
material
manufacturing

Electricity
generation

Fig. 2. Project scope for analysis. The upstream process is the process in the supply chain that provides electricity and materials to the composting system. The displaced
process is replaced by the composting system, which is treated as a credit that is subtracted from the total impacts.

In the composting stage, the feedstocks decompose and emit
various gases to the atmosphere. In this study only emissions
related to C (CO2 and CH4), and N (NH3, NOx and N2O), were
counted. The emission factors applied were referenced from exist-
ing literature. The amounts of emissions were calculated, with C
and N losses between the feeds and the product (compost) having
multiplied emission factors (e.g., kg CO2/tonne C loss in the com-
posting process) (Boldrin et al., 2009). The in-vessel composter
added abundant air every 15 min, therefore, more of the C in the
food waste was able to be converted to CO2 rather than CH4. As a
result, the study applied a higher emission factor for CO2 than that
for Windrow composting. Similarly, more NOx and less NH3 was
generated in the KU composter than in other types of composters.
The total amount of GHG emissions calculated from the com-
poster only included CH4 and N2O. The calculated emissions did
not include the CO2 because it was biological CO2. In addition,
the compositions of the final compost product were based on test-
ing of a sample collected just before the compost was sent to the
farm. The compost test was conducted by Agricultural Analytical
Services Lab (AASLAB) at the PennState University. The daily elec-
tricity use was about 40 kW h, which had been used to account for
indirect impacts. Lastly, the emission factors of the composter
manufacturing were based on the EIO-LCA model developed at
the Green Design Institute of Carnegie Mellon University. The
EIO-LCA model was used since the study only had information
about the composter’s costs available.

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6 D. Mu et al. / Waste Management xxx (2016) xxx–xxx

Table 5 ence between N2O emissions from applying compost and applying
Process design parameters. synthetic fertilizers in soil. The vegetables collected from the gar-
Unit processes Design parameters Reference or data sources den were used as regular vegetables; therefore, no direct emissions
Feedstock collection or fuel use was accounted for in the LCI for vegetable use.
Food waste Composition: C (10– Boldrin et al. (2009), Amlinger The food waste landfilling for comparison with composting
36.5, 18%FMa)b; N et al. (2003) included two stages in the LCI: the food waste transported from
(0.37–1.3, 1%FM) the Kean campus to the landfill, and the waste decomposing in
Wood chips Composition: C (45–50, Casal et al. (2010), Teixeira et al.
47.5%FM); N (0.1–0.2, (2012), Chandrasekaran et al.
the landfill. The assumption was that the food wastes were dis-
0.15%FM) (2012) posed of in a landfill 30 km away using trucks. It was also assumed
Collection: 181.6 kmkg Interview of composter that the landfill contained a methane collection system and lea-
by truck practitioner chate treatment facilities. The emission factors were referenced
Combination ratio:
in the SimaPro 8 database.
food: woodchips: 4:1
by weight
Composting 2.3.3. Life cycle impact analysis (LCIA)
Composting Design capacity: 450 kg Interview of composter The TRACI 2 (Tool for the Reduction and Assessment of Chemi-
foodwaste + 115 kg practitioner cal and other environmental Impacts) analysis method, available in
woodchips/day
SimaPro 8, was applied in the LCIA because it was developed by the
Residence time: 5 days
in vessel + 20 days on U.S. EPA specifically to use in the United States. The study included
site the impact categories: fossil fuel use (MJ primary), climate change
Electricity use: (kg CO2 eq.), acidification (kg SO2 eq.), eutrophication (kg N eq.),
40 kW h/day
ozone depletion (kg CFC-11 eq.), smog formation (kg O3 eq.),
Weight loss: 70% of
feedstock human health impact (carcinogenic CTUe, non-carcinogenic CTUe,
Compost C (45.1%FM) N (2.5%FM) Penn State Agri. Lab compost test and respiratory effect, kg PM2.5 eq.), and ecotoxicity (CTUe). The
P (2227 ppm) K (AASLAB) fossil fuel use accounted for primary nonrenewable fuels including
(6417 ppm) petroleum, natural gas and coal. The climate change was character-
Moisture 10%
ized by using global warming potential (GWP) with the 100 years
Emissions CH4 (0.77–2.5, 1% C Boldrin et al. (2009), Amlinger
lost) et al. (2008), Fisher (2006), time horizon developed by the IPCC. The compounds CO2, CH4
N2O (0.05–1.8, 0.5% N Martinez-Blanco et al. (2010), and N2O were used to calculate the GWP. The acidification was
input) Cabaraban et al. (2008), Cadena characterized by the acidification potential (AP), expressed as SO2
NH3 (0.05–3.9, et al. (2009), Favoino and Hogg
equivalents. The study accounted NOx and NH3 in calculation of
0.5 kg/tonne FM) (2008)
NOx = N lost – NH3 –
AP. Eutrophication was characterized with eutrophication poten-
N2O tial (EP), presented as N equivalents. N equivalents include NOx,
Vegetable growing NH3 and waterborne N and P (when converted to N equivalents).
Fertilizer (0.025 kg N; 2.22 g P; Based on composition of The impact characterizations are described in the SI.
replace 6.4 g K)/kg compost compost
Emissions CO2 locked in soil in Boldrin et al. (2009)
100 years: 2% C input 2.4. Primary cost-benefit analysis
N2O emissions by
replacing fertilizers: The cost-benefit analysis was conducted for food waste com-

0.1% N input
posting. The composter was built in 2009 and cost $88,000. This
Vegetable 7.4 kg/kg compost Vegetable growing lab
harvest
price, though, was discounted greatly because the manufacturer
N and P N leach by replacing Eghball and Gilley (1999), wanted to explore a new market in composting. Currently, a new
leaching fertilizers:
20% N Stewart et al. (1998), Braum composter of similar size costs $188,000. This cost was applied
input (2009), Riley et al. (2001), Leclerc as the capital cost in this study. The facility was assumed to oper-
P leach by replacing et al. (1995), Li et al. (1997),
ate 7 days a week, for 32 weeks ($224 days) each year, with a lifes-
fertilizers:
7.7% P Lehmann and Schroth (2003)
input pan of 15 years. The operation cost included labor costs, electricity
Landfilling costs, utility costs and transportation fuel costs. The food waste
Transportation 30 km away from given to the composter was free, thus the cost for raw materials
campus
was zero. The cost of electricity was based on the facility’s electric-
Landfill Emissions based on SimaPro, 8
SimaPro
ity bill. The electricity cost was $4.0 per day, or $986 per year. It
was assumed that two student workers worked in the composter
a
FM: fresh matter ffi OFMSW: organic fresh municipal solid wastes. at a time. The student worker is responsible for feeding the com-
b
Range, value applied in this study.
poster and emptying the compost. The total time the student
would work for is 2 h per day with $10 per hour. Another student
In the vegetable growing and use stages modeled, the fertilizers worker was assumed to be hired to grow vegetables from April to
replaced were based on nutrients (N, P, and K) contained in com- October (150 days). He/she would work for 3 h a day with a mean
post. The replacing fertilizers were accounted as credits in LCI, wage of $10 per hour. The petroleum used to transport woodchips
i.e., impacts of fertilizer production were subtracted from the total was approximately 0.1 gallons per day, with $1.7 per gallon (in Jan-
impacts of the KU composting system. In addition, many literature uary 2016).
mentioned about how compost could reduce GHG emissions and There were several benefits included in the analysis. One bene-
prevent nutrient leaching (Amlinger et al., 2003; Boldrin et al., fit was that the vegetables harvested were able to be utilized in the
2009; Eghball and Gilley, 1999). For example, compost can bind a student cafeteria which reduced the cost of purchasing vegetables.
fraction of C in soil for more than 100 years by sequestering CO2 Another benefit was that the vegetables could be sold in local gro-
from the atmosphere. A credit of reducing GHG emissions was cery stores or in the farmer’s market, which increased revenue. In a
accounted for in the LCI. The study also included a credit of N2O regular grocery store, the Taiwanese Pai Tsai is sold for $3.3/kg. The
reduction when applying compost. This accounted for the differ- study assumed 60% of harvest vegetables would be sold for
approximately $3.3 per kg in the Farmer’s Markets. The study also

Please cite this article in press as: Mu, D., et al. Environmental and economic analysis of an in-vessel food waste composting system at Kean University in
the U.S.. Waste Management (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2016.10.026
 D. Mu et al. / Waste Management xxx (2016) xxx–xxx 7

used a 35% income tax in the analysis. An additional 40% of the
vegetables were sold to the student cafeteria at Kean with a price
of $2.3/kg. Another direct benefit was the saving of waste disposal
cost. Based on the Organic Waste Audit Report conducted by an
outside consulting company (Manna, 2009), the waste hauling
fee was about $5067.84 per month. The savings was $27,163 per
year, assuming the food wastes was 67% of the total waste gener-
ated at Kean.
Besides direct revenue and savings, the study included social
and environmental benefits. This was done in order to show the
real benefits of composting food wastes. The composter served
as an educational center to Kean students by hosting classes,
lectures, and labs; therefore, an educational benefit was included.
The study recorded the amount of students who visited the com-
poster during the year 2015. The results showed that an estimated
783 students spent at least 30 min in the facility conducting
various academic activities. The study used the tuition paid for
credits to value this benefit. Tuition for a three-credit course per
semester (16 weeks) was $1240 at Kean, therefore, one credit
was $25.88 in this study. The environmental benefits in this study
were analyzed with the same methodology applied in CM
consulting 2007. The study compared environmental impacts of
food waste composting to landfilling. The reduction of impacts
by composting was assigned a money value. Since the data had
limitations, the study only accounted for four impact categories.
The impact category values were $0.02 per MJ reduction of fossil
fuel use, $36 per tonne CO2 eq. reduction of GHG emissions, $4 per
tonne N eq. reduction of eutrophication, and $661 per tonne of
SO2 eq. reduction of acidification.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Life cycle impacts of composting and landfilling
The environmental impacts arose by treating one tonne of fresh
matter (FM) of food wastes inside an in-vessel composting unit and
in a landfill (as shown in Table 6). Studies of other types of com-
posting technologies are listed as well in order to make a full com-
parison. The contributions percentages of the major inputs in the
three life cycle stages of in-vessel composting are shown in Table 7.
This helps identify the hotspots that raise environmental impacts
in the KU composter. In Table 7, transportation in the category of
waste collection refers to the transportation of woodchips from
an outside source, and was accounted for in the impacts. The fertil-
izer in the category of plant growing is synthetic fertilizer pro-
duced, and the emissions are direct emissions or releases from
garden soil.
In general, the in-vessel composting of food wastes at Kean
University has lower impacts in GHG emissions, eutrophication,
smog formation, respiratory effects (PM 2.5), and fossil fuel use.
However, the landfilling scenario has fewer impacts on ozone
depletion, acidification, carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic effects,
and ecotoxicity. The environmental impact of composting was
highest mainly in the composting stage, whereas the impacts of
landfilling were attributed to the landfilling stage. Compared to
the in-vessel composter in the study by Cabaraban et al. (2008),
KU’s in-vessel composter has better performance in GHG
emissions, acidification, and eutrophication; albeit, it has worse
performance in smog formation and fossil fuel use. Compared to
tunnel and windrow composters, the in-vessel composter in this
study has lower impacts only in acidification and eutrophication;
however, it has higher impacts in all other impact categories
reported. A detailed analysis of each impact category was further
conducted.
3.1.1. Ozone depletion
In this study, the ozone depletion potential was found to be
9.5  10
5 kg CFC
11 eq. per tonne FM for the composting scenario,
of which, 82.5% was released from manufacturing compost, and
17.9% was released due to the electricity generation. The replace-
ment of fertilizer with compost reduced the ozone depletion
potential, albeit with a small significance of 5%. The ozone deple-
tion potential of composting was higher than in the landfilling sce-
nario (4.06  10
6 kg CFC
11 eq. per tonne FM). When in-vessel
composting was compared to other types of composting methods,
such as windrows or concrete tunnel composting, the ozone deple-
tion potential was higher. In a study conducted by Cadena et al.
(2009), the ozone depletion potential of a confined windrows com-
posting and tunnel composting was 2.77  10
5 kg and
1.60  10
5 kg CFC
11 eq. per tonne FM respectively. The main rea-
son in-vessel composting had a higher impact is because the in-
vessel composter is composed of steel, which is a product that
releases high ozone depletion materials during the manufacturing
process. In addition, the electricity use for the in-vessel composter
was higher than windrow or tunnel composters, which further
raised the ozone depletion impact.
3.1.2. Greenhouse gas emissions
The greenhouse gas emissions (GWP) of in-vessel composting
was 448 kg CO2 eq. per tonne FM, of which 76.8% of the GHG emis-
sions was from the composter manufacturing, and 16.9% was from
electricity used to compost. Direct emissions accounted for 15.2%
of the total GHG emissions. The plant growing stage reduced
GHG emissions by 9%, which showed that the replacement of

Table 6
Life cycle impacts of various composting technologies and landfilling (per tonne of FM food wastes).

KU KU % difference of Cabaraban et al. Cadena et al. (2009) Martinez-Blanco et al.

In-vessel (2008) (2010)
Impact categories Units In-vessel Landfill From landfill In -vessel Tunnel Windrow Tunnel
Ozone depletion kgCFC-11 eq 9.52E
05 4.06E–06
95.7 1.60E
05 2.77E
05 1.30E
05
Global warming kg CO2 eq 4.48E+02 6.48E+02 44.6 8.60E+02 6.39E+01 6.32E+01 2.05E+02
Smog kg O3 eq 2.93E+00 7.43E+00 153.5 0.00E+00 2.23E
01 5.33E+00 9.43E
01
Acidification kg SO2 eq 2.37E+00 4.68E
01
80.3 8.00E–01 7.13E+00 3.70E+00 7.80E
01
Eutrophication kg N eq
4.41E+00 1.34E+00
130.5 4.38E
02 2.23E
01 1.13E
01 2.25E
01
Carcinogenics CTUh 2.25E
05 1.56E
07
99.3
Non carcinogenics CTUh 3.95E
04 1.16E
06
99.7
Respiratory effects kg PM2.5 eq 1.91E
02 1.24E
01 547.4
Ecotoxicity CTUe 2.52E+03 1.29E+01
99.5
Fossil fuel use MJ primary 1.44E+03 1.45E+03 1.1 4.00E+02 1.90E+03

Please cite this article in press as: Mu, D., et al. Environmental and economic analysis of an in-vessel food waste composting system at Kean University in
the U.S.. Waste Management (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2016.10.026
8 D. Mu et al. / Waste Management xxx (2016) xxx–xxx

Table 7
Contributions of life cycle stages to life cycle impacts of KU composting.

Collection Composting Plant and grow Total

Fuel Direct emissions Manufacturing Electricity Fertilizer Direct emissions
Impact categories Units % % % % % % %
Ozone depletion kgCFC-11 eq 0.00 82.54 17.87
0.41 100.00
Global warming kg CO2 eq 0.01 15.25 76.76 16.94
5.19
3.78 100.00
Smog kg O3 eq 0.21 25.21 94.13
19.54 100.00
Acidification kg SO2 eq 0.01 86.58 4.89 18.48
9.96 100.00
Eutrophication kg N eq 0.00 1.23 0.31 2.76
60.93
43.37
100.00
Carcinogenics CTUh 0.00 93.60 8.57
2.17 100.00
Non carcinogenics CTUh 0.00 98.48 2.43
0.91 100.00
Respiratory effects kg PM2.5 eq 0.02 29.04 150.79
79.85 100.00
Ecotoxicity CTUe 0.00 86.01 17.04
3.05 100.00
Fossil fuel use MJ primary 0.04 0.26 130.33
30.62 100.00

fertilizers contributed to reducing GHG emissions. The GHG emis-
sions from the KU composting system were 31% lower than land-
filling (650 kg CO2 eq. per tonne OFMSW). This is mainly due to
the fact that a significant amount of methane (CH4) is released in
landfills. The greenhouse gas emissions the in-vessel composter
in this study is lower than the study by Cabaraban et al. (2008),
in which the food wastes collection accounted for 1/3 of the total
emissions. Because the food wastes at Kean University were col-
lected on campus and treated immediately, no emissions were
released during waste collection. This decreased the GHG emis-
sions significantly. GHG emissions were higher from the in-vessel
composter when compared to the tunnel composters and confined
windrow composters. The main reason for higher GHGs in the in-
vessel composting is due to its higher electricity use (180 kW h/t
FM) than the tunnel composting (50.5 kW h/t FM) and the wind-
row composting (65.5 kW h/t FM). In addition, making a steel com-
poster released a lot more GHG emissions than concrete tunnels
and windrow composters.
3.1.3. Smog formation
The smog formation potential of the study was 2.93 kg O3 eq. per
tonne of FM. This is 6.1% lower than the landfilling scenario (7.42
O3 kg eq. per tonne of FM). The high O3 released in landfills con-
tributed the higher smog formation potential in the landfilling sce-
nario. The results showed that 94.1% of smog formation potential
was due to electricity use. This is because electricity generation
released a significant amount of NOx, a precursor of O3. In contrast,
the composter manufacturing contributed to 25.2% of the total
smog formation potential. The plant growing stage reduced the
smog formation potential by 19.5% by replacing the fertilizers typ-
ically used. Compared to the other types of composters, the in-
vessel composter has a higher smog formation potential as well.
The higher smog formation occurs mainly because of the high elec-
tricity use from KU’s composter. In addition, the studies by
Cabaraban et al. (2008) and Cadena et al. (2009) did not take into
account the composter manufacturing in their calculations, which
lead to lower impacts.
3.1.4. Acidification
The Acidification potential of the study was 2.37 kg SO2 eq. per
tonne of FM, which is 5.1 times greater than the landfill scenario.
The higher impact on acidification is mainly caused by direct emis-
sions of NH3 (0.63 kg/tonne FM) and NOx (1.24 kg/tonne FM) from
the composting stage, which accounted for 86.6% of the total acid-
ification potential. The electricity generation made up 18.5% of the
total emissions. The replacement of fertilizers reduced acidification
by 10%. Although the result on acidification of this study was
higher than the study of an in-vessel composter by Cabaraban
et al. (2008), the major factors identified for acidification potential
were the same, i.e., NH3 emissions and electricity use. The result of
this study was lower than the results in Cadena et al. (2009), for
the tunnel and windrow composting. The NH3 emission rate from
the tunnel composter was 3.9 kg/tonne FM, and from the windrow
composter it was 2 kg/tonne FM. However, in the study of tunnel
composting by Martinez-Blanco et al. (2010), the direct NH3 emis-
sion was 0.11 kg/tonne FM, which led to the acidification being
lower than this study. Since Kean’s composter was operated in
an intense aeration stage, followed by windrow composting, the
NH3 emission rate applied in this study is appropriate.
3.1.5. Eutrophication
The eutrophication potential of this study was
4.41 kg N eq. per
tonne FM. This value means that the in-vessel composting is able
to lock nutrients in soil and prevent them from leaching. The neg-
ative eutrophication potential occurred because of the replacement
of synthetic fertilizers. Since both fertilizer production and applica-
tion release nutrients, which cause eutrophication, replacing the
fertilizers with compost reduced the eutrophication potential sig-
nificantly. The eutrophication potential of this study was lower
than landfill and all other composting technologies, because they
did not include replacing fertilizers in their LCA analysis.
3.1.6. Fossil fuel use
The fossil fuel use for in-vessel composting was 1440 MJ per
tonne FM. This value is slightly lower than the landfill scenario.
Almost all of the fossil fuel use was attributed to electricity use
in the composting process. Replacing fertilizer reduced the fossil
fuel use by 30.6%. In addition, because of the high electricity use,
the fossil fuel consumption of KU’s composter was higher than
for the in-vessel composter studied by Cabaraban et al. (2008).
However, this study showed the KU’s in-vessel composter had less
fossil fuel use than the tunnel composter studied by Martinez-
Blanco et al. (2010), in which the benefits of replacing fertilizers
in the plant growing stage did not added.
3.1.7. Carcinogenics, non-carcinogenics, and respiratory effects
The carcinogenics, non-carcinogenics, and respiratory effects are
impacts related to human health. The carcinogenics and non-
carcinogenics released from composting were higher than from
landfilling. The higher impacts were caused by the composter man-
ufacturing, since the steel manufacturing released many carcino-
genics and non-carcinogenics. The respiratory effects of
composting, though, were better than landfilling. This may have
occurred because steel manufacturing does not release a lot of
PM 2.5 into the atmosphere. The major factor leading to PM 2.5
being released in composting is the electricity generation. How-
ever, the total amount released was lower than the amount
released from a landfill.

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 D. Mu et al. / Waste Management xxx (2016) xxx–xxx
3.1.8. Ecotoxicity
Ecotoxicity is an impact on the ecological system. The results
showed that the Ecotoxicity of in-vessel composting is much
higher than the impact from landfilling, and 86% of the ecotoxicity
is attributed to the composter manufacturing. This is because in-
vessel composting uses huge amount of steel whose ecotoxicity
impact in manufacturing is very high. This study only counted eco-
toxicity in the supply chain of in-vessel composter, as no data or
literatures are available to the ecotoxicity of using food waste com-
post in farms. However, many research have been conducted tests
on ecotoxicity for compost from other wastes. For example, Young
et al. (2016) proposed the poultry manure compost was more toxic
to radish than lettuce and Daphnid, and it was more toxic to plants
than compost from other wastes. Future studies could focus on
testing ecotoxicity of food waste compost, which could help estab-
lish the LCA database. The results from this study helped to identify
key composting stages that caused impacts. Firstly, for KU’s com-
posting system, the impacts in the waste collection stage were
all less than 0.2%. This implies that the effects in this stage were
minimal. This is because the food wastes were all generated on
campus, and so no vehicle or machines were needed for collection
or transportation. As a result, the only process that contributed
towards the impact was the transportation of woodchips to the
composter. This shows the advantage of composting on a univer-
sity’s campus where large quantities of wastes are created on site.
By composting on site the impacts from waste collection can be
neglected, which lowers the overall impacts on the environment.
Secondly, environmental impacts were mainly from the com-
posting stage. In particular, using electricity, and building the in-
vessel composter, raised the environmental impacts and contribu-
tions significantly, which led to the total impacts being much
higher than the direct emissions. After analyzing the process, it
was found that aeration for composting is a key factor in determin-
ing the electricity use. Approximate 60% of the electricity use was
from aeration, and about 40% was used for shredding and mixing
the food waste/compost. Presently, the composter adds air every
15 min. This value is higher than other in-vessel composters and
tunneled composters discussed in literatures, which leads to
higher impacts from KU’s composter than in other studies. If the
process reduced the aeration frequency, the impacts would be
reduced. This should be true for the impact categories of smog, res-
piratory effects, and fossil fuel use, because electricity use con-
tributes immensely towards those categories. Reducing the
aeration rate, though, will slow down food decomposition, and
increase the residence time of the feedstock; therefore, the aera-
tion rate needs to be reduced within a limit, otherwise it will result
in the quality of compost being influenced. In addition, decreasing
the amount of air input into the composter will lead to more CH4
and NH3 released during composting. Consequently, the global
warming and acidification potentials will be increased.
Another factor that contributes the environmental impacts is
the size of the composter. The size of the composter determines
the quantity of steel needed to build the in-vessel composter. Nor-
mally, the size depends on the desired amount of waste being trea-
ted and the designed residence time. The more wastes or the
higher residence time is required, the bigger composter is needed.
Once the quantity of waste is determined, an appropriate residence
time should be selected. If the residence time is too long, this
denotes that the size of the composter is large, which in turn
increases the environmental impacts. However, if the residence
time is too short, the waste is not able to fully decompose. If it is
not allowed to fully decompose, then the ammonium concentra-
tion in compost is higher than usual, which is harmful to plants.
When examining the KU composter, the designed waste flow rate
is 1000 lb per day with residence time of 5 days. The actual waste
available, though, was only 490 lb per day, which is much lower
Please cite this article in press as: Mu, D., et al. Environmental and economic analysis of an in-vessel food waste composting system at Kean University in
the U.S.. Waste Management (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2016.10.026
9
than the designed capacity. This means that the designed com-
poster size is larger than required to treat the existing food wastes.
As a result, higher environmental impact values were assigned to
each tonne of waste since the composter was not used to its full
capacity. The size of the composter cannot be changed after it is
built; therefore, in order to reduce the environmental impacts,
the study suggests lowering the aeration rate and increasing the
residence time in the composter. This way, the electricity use is
reduced, but the quality of the compost is still maintained.
Lastly, the impacts in the plant growing and use stage were all
negative, leading to a decrease in the total impacts. In particular,
this stage reduces GHG emissions by 9%, smog by 20%, eutrophica-
tion by 100%, PM 2.5 by 80%, and fossil fuel use by 30%. The bene-
fits assigned by replacing fertilizers contributed to the negative
impacts in this stage. In addition, by applying compost, the ability
of locking C, N and P in soil increased, and which resulted in neg-
ative impacts. This demonstrates how the application of compost
could reduce environmental impacts of the entire composting
system.
3.2. Economic analysis of KU’s composting system
The economic performance of KU’s composter was discussed in
two scenarios. One was based on direct cost, saving and income,
i.e., real money flows related to composter operations. The second
was the added indirect benefits, including social and environmen-
tal benefits into the analysis. The results are shown in Table 8.
The cost for the composter included the investment cost
(
$12,533 per year) and operational cost ($
15,919 per year).
The labor cost was a major operational cost that constituted 91%
of the total operational cost. The cost per ton of food waste pro-
duced was $695, which is much higher than existing studies
(Table 2). This is mainly due to the fact that the composter was
not operated at full capacity (39.2 ton/year), which increased the
cost per ton. If the composter operated at full capacity (112 ton/
year), the cost would be able to be reduced to $254 per ton. This
value is lower than the in-vessel composter value studied in
Cabaraban et al. (2008). The analysis also showed that KU’s in-
vessel composting has higher costs than other types of composting
technologies. This is because both capital costs and operational
costs were higher than other technologies.
The results showed that by applying compost towards growing
Taiwanese Pai Tsai, revenue could be increased by $13,197 annu-
ally. This leads to the breakeven point after 7.3 years of compost-
ing. The benefits were mainly from two areas. The first was from
selling vegetables to markets ($13,292 per year). The second was
the savings on waste disposal ($27,164 per year). The savings from
waste disposal was another major benefit, twice to selling vegeta-
bles. However, the analysis showed if the system did not sell veg-
etables and depended only on disposal savings, the entire system
was losing money (
$95 per year). This demonstrates that with
appropriate compost application, the composting system becomes
a new source of revenue. The results also showed that if indirect
costs were added, i.e., educational and environmental benefits, into
the analysis, the revenue of the KU’s composting system increased
to $23,546 per year. In particular, the educational benefit ($10,130
per year) was almost the same as the income by selling vegetables.
The environmental benefit ($223 per year) was not high when
compared to the education benefit. The major environmental ben-
efit was from the reduction of GHG emissions due to the decrease
of food wastes being landfilled.
Although economic analysis showed that the cost of the in-
vessel composting technology is much higher than other technolo-
gies, the in-vessel composter has certain advantages when com-
pared to other technologies. This is especially true when applying
it at a university’s campus located in an urban area. In this condi-
10 D. Mu et al. / Waste Management xxx (2016) xxx–xxx

Table 8
Primary cost-benefit analysis.

Composter scale 1000 lb/day

Food waste rate 35,515 kg/year
Composter operation 224 day/year
Compost produced 13,377 kg/yr
Planting cycle 5 /yr
Yield 1202 /cycle
Unit price $/year
Capital cost 188,000 $ 15 yr
12,533
Operation cost
12,179
Electricity 4 $/day 896
Labor for running composter 10 $/h 3 h/day 6720
Labor for growing vegetable 10 $/h 3 h/day 4500
Petroleum fuel 1.7 $/gallon 22.4 gallon/yr. 38
Seed 1 $/bag 5 bags/cycle 25
Income from vegetable 13,292
Sold outside 3.3 $/kg 721 kg/cycle 11,903
Sold inside 2.31 $/kg 481 kg/cycle 5555
Income tax 35 %
Cost saving on waste disposal 27,164
Waste hauling fee 5067.84 $/month 67 % food wastes
Total 15,743
Educational benefits
Tuition $25.88 /credit 391.5 h/yr 10,130
Environmental benefits 223
Reduce of fossil fuel use $0.02 /MJ fuel use 561.71 MJ 11
GHG emissions $36.00 /TonGHG 7.09 tons 255
Eutrophication $4.00 /TonN eq. 0.20 tons 1
Acidification $661.00 /TonSO2 eq.
0.07 tons
45
Total 26,096

tion, using windrow is not appropriate, because food wastes are
exposed to air, which makes dust and unpleasant odors. This will
bring both safety and aesthetic concerns among students. In addi-
tion, the leachate created in composting can contaminate the soil
or leach to local water bodies causing eutrophication. The tunnel
composter has the same problem with smell and leachate. With
in-vessel composting, however, by adding intensive air, the decom-
posing rate speeds up significantly. Within 5 days, the total weight
can be reduced by 25%. The compost product has a less pungent
odor than windrow because the CH4 and NH3 emissions were
lower. The final compost product can be applied on land immedi-
ately once cooled down, even though it would be better to store
the compost for another 20 days before applying it in the garden.
The use of an in-vessel composter allows the leachate to be col-
lected and controlled easily. Therefore, the investment towards
purchasing an in-vessel composter in universities or organizations
located in urban areas is recommended.
3.3. Applying the in-vessel composting in Universities across the U.S.
Based on environmental and economic analysis, the in-vessel
composting is suitable for use in universities. If the all the food
wastes in the U.S. universities (over 4200 colleges/universities in
the U.S. with approximately 20.25 million students enrolled in
2016 NCES, 2013) were composted with in-vessel composting,
the estimated food wastes created would be 60,000 metric tons
per year. If each institution were to install a similar on-site in-
vessel composting system to divert food scraps away from landfills,
the reduction on GHG emissions would reach 12,000 metric tons of
CO2 equivalents per year. This is equal to the emissions of 2550
passenger vehicles (4.7 metric tons CO2 per year per passenger
vehicle (US EPA, 2014a)). At the same time, it will create 39.7 mil-
lions of total revenues for those universities/colleges.
Definitely, there are limitations of applying the in-vessel com-
posting on University campuses. Although the odor of in-vessel
composting is much lower than other composting technologies, it
would still rise complains from students. Especially, the in-vessel
composter is usually located close to student cafeterias where food
wastes are collected. Adding an equipment to control odor could be
a choice, but this will increase the investment. Secondly, finding a
user for compost could be challenging especially for city-based
Universities. If the University transports compost to farms located
in other regions, impacts will increase accordingly. Finally, the
nutrients levels of vegetables derived from compost are different
from regular vegetables. The university cafeterias or high-end
restaurants may hesitate to accept those vegetables.
For the universities who would like to adapt an in-vessel com-
posting, several suggestions were proposed: (1) The university
should conduct a full scale auditing of organic waste streams gen-
erated on campus in order to determine the scale/size of the com-
poster and also the location of the composter. (2) The university
should not set too ambitious plan when determining the size of
the composter, because the environmental impacts are directly
related to the size of the composter. It is better to start with the
pre-customer food wastes, because they are easier to be collected
and separated, and then the university can gradually scale up the
composting process. (3) The compost from the in-vessel composter
is better to pile up and stored for months for further decomposing.
This could reduce the ammonia content in compost and increase
plant’s up-taking rate. (4) The student cafeterias should be aware
of the nutrient differences between compost derived vegetables
and regular vegetables and should develop special recipes to adapt
the changes.
4. Conclusion
This study focused on in-vessel composting applied for Kean
Universities where large volumes of food waste could be generated
daily. The analysis covered the entire life cycle of the system, from
waste collection, all the way to produce consumption in the stu-
dent cafeteria. In-vessel composting is better than landfilling the
food wastes because it reduces the environmental impact in cer-
tain impact categories. In particular, in-vessel composting can
reduce GHG emissions and eutrophication when compared to

Please cite this article in press as: Mu, D., et al. Environmental and economic analysis of an in-vessel food waste composting system at Kean University in
the U.S.. Waste Management (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2016.10.026
 D. Mu et al. / Waste Management xxx (2016) xxx–xxx
landfilling. Compared to other composting technologies, the in-
vessel composting has higher impacts and higher costs, albeit it
has a less pungent odor and is resist to environment changes.
The compost manufacturing and electricity use are key factors
towards environmental impacts. By building the appropriate com-
poster size and controlling the aeration rate, the environmental
performance can be improved and the systems costs can be
improved. Lastly, a vegetable garden can improve the environmen-
tal and economic performance of the system. Overall, in-vessel
composting followed by a vegetable garden has both environmen-
tal and economic benefits. In-vessel composting should be applied
to universities or food markets that generate intensive food waste
across the U.S.
Acknowledgement
ORSP at Kean University provided the funding to support this
study. The Environmental Health and Safety manager, Suzanne
Kupiec at Kean University provided information and data on com-
poster’s operating and maintaining.
Appendix A. Supplementary material
Supplementary data associated with this article can be found, in
the online version, at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2016.10.
026.
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