AdkAction is announcing the “Adirondack Compost for Good” project, which will promote food waste composting in the Adirondacks as New York heads toward its 2022 ban on landfilling food wastes of a certain volume throughout the state.

The goal of the project is to help Adirondack communities turn food and other organic “wastes” into a soil amendment, which is the material added to soil to improve its physical or chemical properties.

“If global food waste were a country, it would be the third-largest greenhouse gas emitter in the world, according to the United Nation Food and Agriculture Organization,” an AdkAction press release says.

The press release says community-level composting options are limited in the Adirondack region, but that four local residents with a passion for turning waste into “black gold,” are working on changing that.

Thanks to a 2016 grant from the state Energy Research and Development Authority, and project management help from the Adirondack North Country Association, the North Country School was able to secure a grant to build a novel, community-scale composter designed by John Culpepper and a local contractor, Greg LeClair.

John Culpepper and two others, Jennifer Perry and Katie Culpepper, have been working to promote the use of this composter and the benefits of composting. The first of these composters has already diverted more than 120,000 pounds of food waste from landfills. Since then, four more have been modeled after the original prototype, and are now in operation.

After strong interest and proven success with the design, the trio decided it was time to bring their expertise and the resources they have developed to an established organization that could help take the work to the next level.

“It is a great pleasure for us to be working with AdkAction, its board of directors, and staff to help us spark a composting revolution in the North Country,” John Culpepper said.

“As soon as John, Katie, and Jen brought this project idea to us in January, I knew it was a good fit for AdkAction,” AdkAction Executive Director Brittany Christenson said.