Compostable Tray Project

“Success Story: Compostable Tray Project”

With initial funding provided by the Lonnie & Carol Poole Family Foundation during the 2024-25 school year, Toward Zero Waste partnered with nine Wake County public school system (WCPSS) schools to switch from polystyrene lunch trays to compostable fiber trays, along with composting services to handle them properly.

So far, the program has kept over 500,000 trays out of the landfill—and counting. While TZW is no longer able to provide funding or program administration, several of the original schools have continued the program using their own PTA budgets—underscoring the direct benefit to students, from reduced waste in their cafeterias to hands-on experience with more sustainable habits.

At the same time, this effort has always been a partial solution. Compostable trays reduce harm compared to polystyrene, but they’re still single-use. The sensible longer-term approach we encourage WCPSS to adopt is reusable systems for trays and cutlery in school cafeterias.

The goal of this initiative was to offset and divert overall waste that comes from the cafeterias each day, reducing the overall impact to our local landfill. The schools that participated in the program composted their lunch trays through a private compost hauler.

The Schools that Participated were: