Nov 10, 2025
Reading time: about 6 minutes
Packaged food waste is being sent to composting and AD facilities in large quantities, creating a contamination crisis that is having a significant financial impact on these operators. This surge is being driven by government food waste regulations and manufacturers creating mountains of off-spec, expired and unmarketable goods. In this interview, Corey Rossen from Ecoverse, a provider of environmental processing equipment technologies, discusses the sources of contamination, the problems it causes in facilities, and how waste operators can deal with it.
Corey Rossen fro…
Nov 10, 2025
Reading time: about 6 minutes
Packaged food waste is being sent to composting and AD facilities in large quantities, creating a contamination crisis that is having a significant financial impact on these operators. This surge is being driven by government food waste regulations and manufacturers creating mountains of off-spec, expired and unmarketable goods. In this interview, Corey Rossen from Ecoverse, a provider of environmental processing equipment technologies, discusses the sources of contamination, the problems it causes in facilities, and how waste operators can deal with it.
Corey Rossen from Ecoverse, a provider of environmental processing equipment technologies.
- © Kellermayr
How significant is packaged food contamination for composting and anaerobic digestion operators today?
Any amount of contamination from food waste packaging (plastic, aluminium, etc) in the organic material added to compost and anaerobic digestion can be a highly significant problem that needs to be addressed and managed properly. Contamination in compost can decrease its overall quality and lower the value of compost products, affecting its sale price. Contamination in anaerobic digesters may lower energy production levels and cause the need for an increased amount of complete digester clean-out requirements.
Are you seeing more packaged food waste coming to facilities? What’s driving this increase?
There is a great deal more packaged food waste being sent to waste management facilities. In correlation, there are also many more different types of packaging materials arriving at these facilities as well. The increase in material is driven by several factors, including the introduction of governmental regulations that mandate specific food waste management requirements, increased market needs that lead to manufacturers producing more products than ever while having to manage the increase of off-spec, expired, or non-marketable goods, and due to many large and small companies implementing environmentally conscious zero waste initiatives.
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How are operators currently dealing with packaged food waste? What are the main strategies and their limitations?
Facilities have several ways of managing packaged food waste. The most common ways are manually, mechanically, or simply by refusing the packaged material. Facilities that refuse the packaged material due to capability and/or capacity issues (such as not having enough employees to manage the material or other reasons) are greatly limiting their profitability and organic/nutrient availability to their business based upon the massive amounts of food waste material available in the market stream. Facilities can manage packaged food waste manually, with staff members separating the organics from its packaging by hand. This method is slow, tedious, and limits the amount and types of food waste products that can be managed; therefore, facilities may not be capturing the full value of the food waste revenue stream. Mechanical separation, with the depackaging machines such as the Tiger Depack, optimises production rates, material volumes/quantities, food and packaging types, efficiencies, and maximises revenue capabilities. A limitation with mechanical separation could be the upfront capital cost of affording depackaging equipment.
One economic burden that food waste packaging contamination places on operators is based on the value of the material produced at their facility. Contaminated compost will not be valued in the retail market at the same price as contamination-free compost; therefore, revenue generation and profit margins are different (less).
What economic burden does packaged food contamination place on operators?
One economic burden that food waste packaging contamination places on operators is based on the value of the material produced at their facility. Contaminated compost will not be valued in the retail market at the same price as contamination-free compost; therefore, revenue generation and profit margins are different (less). Anaerobic digestion facilities with contaminated material will need to clean out their digesters more often than if they had no contamination, increasing overhead costs and material processing downtime, both factors in reducing profitability.
Another of the burdens that may impact the economics of managing the many different types of packaged food waste material is the need for facilities to have multiple material handling pieces of equipment to manage all of the differing waste streams. The need for more than one type of handling equipment can be observed within the varieties of food waste received at the site (palletised, SSO, etc) and the method that it is transported to them (tractor-trailer truck, side load garbage truck, etc). Materials that can be managed with a forklift are not necessarily also able to be managed with a front-end loader, so the facility is required to have both in order to handle the varying food waste products. The cost factor of having multiple pieces of material handling equipment adds to the overhead cost for the facility.
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What are your top recommendations for operators struggling with packaged food contamination?
I would recommend that operators become familiar with their depackaging equipment, differing feedstock materials, and learn the cause and effect of operational variables. Contamination issues can be managed with simple adjustments of the machine operations (example: speed settings), small variations or combinations to the introduction of different feedstocks during processing, and determination if adding a liquid source (or removing liquids) aids in the elimination of contamination. All of these determinations can be learned through familiarity with the equipment and its management of the various types of feedstock materials.
Do you think regulations are needed to address this problem? What kind?
Regulations could help address some of the problems associated with packaging contamination. The regulations could help to promote and narrow down the types of materials used in packaging, supporting (such as in the form of financial incentives) recyclable materials and therefore minimising non-recyclable packaging products in the market. Though it would be nearly impossible to standardise packaging materials, recyclable/compostable versions of different types of packaging could be researched, developed, and introduced to address the many different types of food product packaging currently available. This concept is an example of a developmentally expensive alternative to current packaging materials, showing where financial motivations to incentivise utilising recyclable packaging products could be beneficial.
Manufacturers can help waste companies manage contamination from packaging by minimising material varieties used in the packaging of their products while also being mindful of available recyclable/compostable options.
Where is the industry heading for handling packaged food waste? Any game-changing technologies?
The industry will continue to produce massive amounts of packaged food waste because the market demands it. Depackaging equipment, such as the Tiger Depack, will continue to grow in operational importance, sales/distribution, and technological advancements to keep up with the high demands of the food waste management industry. Technologies surrounding food packaging management will continue to be developed to meet and exceed the requirements of the market and governmental regulations which will result in the benefit to the environment, compost facilities, and anaerobic digestion companies everywhere.
What challenges do packaging manufacturers, retailers, and waste companies have with managing contamination levels? How can manufacturers, retailers, and waste companies help with the problem of contamination?
There are many challenges that retailers, manufacturers, and waste management companies face when dealing with packaged products. Retailers do not have control over the freshness (or expiration date) of the food they are receiving, which may limit the time that the food is available to be safely sold from their shelves. Manufacturers must often utilise several different kinds of packaging in order to produce and distribute foods safely. This may involve a food product enclosed in plastic (such as PET), then wrapped in a different type of plastic (such as LDPE) and boxed together for sale and/or distribution in cardboard boxes which makes it difficult for waste management companies to manage the many types of materials existing sometimes within just one product. They face these challenges while trying to sort out recyclables from non-recyclables from many products in bulk loads in a short, efficient amount of time. Each of these product management categories may struggle to achieve their desired goal of recycling and removing packaging contamination due to the many challenges they face, but each has shown great effort and dedication to making the strides necessary to move forward towards making it possible.
Manufacturers can help waste companies manage contamination from packaging by minimising material varieties used in the packaging of their products while also being mindful of available recyclable/compostable options. Retailers can help waste companies eliminate contamination in organics by sorting and separating food waste materials while in their possession. If the materials are properly sorted before waste management companies become involved, it could allow for easier processing and better overall results in material separation, operational efficiencies, recycling capabilities, repurposing opportunities, and minimise contamination in the separated organics. In the end, this not only helps manage materials better and control contamination levels, but it also helps the environment.
Post Date
Nov 10, 2025
Last Update
Nov 10, 2025