Organic waste bans have failed to divert waste from United States landfills—except in Massachusetts

Organic waste bans have failed to divert waste from United States landfills—except in Massachusetts
Organic waste bans have failed to divert waste from United States landfills—except in Massachusetts

 

 

Diverting food waste from landfills is a critical step to reduce emissions and meet Paris Agreement targets. Between 2014 and 2024, nine US states banned commercial waste generators—such as grocery chains—from landfilling organic waste, expecting a 10-15% waste reduction. However, no evaluation of these bans exists. To study the bans' effects on landfilled waste, we compile a comprehensive waste dataset covering 36 US states between 1996 and 2019. Contrary to policymakers' expectations, we can reject aggregate waste reductions higher than 3.8% and cannot reject a zero-null aggregate effect. Moreover, we cannot reject a zero-null effect for any state in our data, except for Massachusetts, which gradually achieved a 12.5% reduction—matching expectations. Our findings reveal an urgent need to reassess organic waste bans, using Massachusetts as a benchmark for success.

 

 

Ioannis (Yannis) Stamatopoulos is an Associate Professor in the Department of Information, Risk, and Operations Management at the McCombs School of Business, The University of Texas at Austin. He teaches experiential-learning courses with real industry cases and projects, as well as pricing and revenue management, operations management, and empirical methods. Professor Stamatopoulos has published extensively in top-tier journals, including Management Science, Operations Research, and Marketing Science, where his work bridges the fields of operations, marketing, technology, and economics. He is an Associate Editor for the Manufacturing and Service Operations Management (MSOM) journal and serves as a judge for several research competitions. Professor Stamatopoulos holds a B.S. in Mathematics from the University of Athens and earned an M.A. in Economics, and a Ph.D. in Operations Management from Northwestern University.

 

The seminar is part of the series of seminars of the Master's Program (MSC) "Management of Supply Chain and Logistics" (DEAL) of the Department of Mechanical Engineering. More information:: http://master-supply-chain-management-logistics.mie.uth.gr.