According to Stats Canada, there are approximately 3.5 million dogs in Canada and that equates to alot of doggie poop. The biggest carbon footprint from our best friend is their daily business. The plastic bags used in the cleanup afterwards will be around alot longer then the dogs themselves.
San Francisco, with 120,000 dogs (more than children), collects 6,500 tonnes of doggie waste. A waste management company
Norcal, collects the dog poop and
converts it into energy using an
aerobic digester that converts it to methane gas. The remains from the "digestion process" is used as compost for agriculture and the methane gas can be burned to produce electricity.
What can we do if we don't have an aerobic digester? For starters, we can stop using plastic bags; they will sit in the landfill for the next million years. If you use newspaper or paper bags, they will decompose and you can supplement the paper with the
Skooperbox which is completely biodegradable.
There's also the
Doggie Dooley compost system. It's a miniature septic tank that is easy to install and you just need to add water and digester powder. They are available at most larger
pet stores.
If you want to build your own composting system,
City Farmer has step-by-step photos and video instructions. You just have to teach Fido to use the composter directly.
Source:
Article in Green Living Online titled "Greening the Doggie Do"
