Mayor Bloomberg is planning to expand a food-recycling program that is one of his administration’s final pet projects — and to also seek proposals to build a plant that would turn the table scraps into bio-gas.
In May Bloomberg launched a pilot program on Staten Island, where residents tossed their leftover grub into special sidewalk bins or communal baskets in apartment buildings. The waste was then transferred to a city-owned composting site on the island.
His aides said more than 43 percent of homes selected for the program have participated since its launch in May, and the plan is to expand it citywide in the fall on a voluntary basis for some residential buildings.
By next year, the administration expects 150,000 single-family homes and more than 100 high-rises to join.
Officials anticipate it will become mandatory as early as 2015 or 2016 — although Bloomberg leaves office next January and it would be up to his successor to continue the program.
Meanwhile, the administration is searching for a company to build a plant to process the food scraps into bio-gas, which would be used to generate electricity.
The program is Bloomberg’s attempt to improve the city’s underwhelming recycling rate.
In Fiscal Year 2012, only 16.6 percent of the city’s waste was recycled or “diverted” from landfills, according to the Mayor’s Management Report. That’s a 10-percent drop from the previous year.
Bloomberg’s goal is a 30 percent recycling rate by 2017, according to his spokeswoman, Lauren Passalacqua.