CHESHIRE — With up to a quarter of the waste in municipal garbage loads made up of food, the Northern Berkshire Solid Waste District is trying to make it easier for residents to compost.

Now through June 10, Berkshire County residents can order an 80-gallon plastic compost bin at state cost, $65 each.

The Orbis Earth Machines, Home Composting Units will be delivered June 30 at the Cheshire transfer station at 6 Main St. for pickup.

Linda Cernik, Northern Berkshire Solid Waste District director, explained that the drums fit together simply and require hand-mixing in order to achieve compost.

One catch for rural residents: These particular compost bins aren't designed to be bear proof, Cernik said.

The state Department of Environmental Protection, which regulates what goes in landfills, has been tightening what goes into the waste stream in recent years, with old clothing, mattresses and commercial food waste as the latest restrictions put in place in 2022.

Meanwhile, municipal trash — at least that in the communities served by the Northern Berkshire — is now being trucked out of state, to a landfill in Morrisonville, N.Y.

Cernik doesn’t know what’s coming next as far as state regulations, but John Pitroff, founder and CEO of Second Chance Composting, said he’s meeting with the head of DEP on Friday and he expected to discuss the prospect of tightening regulations over the food waste stream.

Pitroff is the only hauler in Berkshire County who also composts the materials he hauls and puts them back into circulation as compost.

“We do this every day, so we know kind of the basic common sense things that you have to have in preparation for such a big scale thing,” he said of the prospect of the state tightening its municipal food waste regulations. “So, they’re slowly trying to lower that.”

He said the DEP offered grants to compost haulers and processes to meet the increased demand.

He’s received two grants from DEP for his operations.

“There’s barely any haulers and there’s like almost no processors,” he said.

Pitroff credits Dicken Crane at Holiday Brook Farm in Dalton for accepting food waste for compost, and other farmers that compost, as well.

Tommy’s Compost Service and Berkshire Compost both haul to farms, but Pitroff has the only business dedicated to both hauling and processing compost.

Corey McGrath, Cheshire’s Department of Public Works director, said Cheshire has been able to divert food from its waste stream, both through residential composting, and through drop-off of food waste at the landfill, which Tommy’s Compost Service hauls twice a week.

But Cernik said it can take awhile for composting to catch on.

“It’s not going to happen the first year,” she said.