Is Your Dog’s Poop Bag Really Eco-friendly?

By Barry Rueger
Published: Asparagus Magazine
April 4, 2025
1483 words
Read on-line.

The story of compostable dog-poop bags is complicated—as is the story of dog-poop disposal in general.

According to some accounts, the idea of a small bag that could be used to pick up dog poop dates back to 1986, when Californian businessman Chris Crosson created the first dog-poop bag. Another claim dates it to the early 20th century, when Teddy Roosevelt got tired of cleaning up his dog’s droppings and instead would carry a pocket-sized bag for that purpose.

Regardless of who had the idea first, over the past 100 years it has been almost universally accepted that every dog owner should collect their pet’s waste. More controversial is the question of how that waste should be disposed of.

Dog waste carries diseases, so you want to keep it away from food, gardens, and waterways. Disease experts such as the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say that dog feces can spread pathogens ranging from Campylobacter, Giardia, and E. coli, to hookworm and roundworm.

Even setting aside the disease problems, piles of dog poop on sidewalks and lawns are unpleasant, smell bad, and ick up your shoes when, inevitably, you step in them. Grabbing poop with a little plastic bag and tying the top shut seems like a simple solution—unless you’re trying to do it sustainably.
What’s your bag?

What’s your bag?

If you walk into any pet store, you’ll see shelves full of poop bags of different brands and colours—most of them manufactured in China, but some in the US or Canada. Many of them will claim to be “compostable.” The problem is how you define that term.

The group that certifies most products as “compostable” in North America is the Biodegradable Products Institute (BPI). They have tested thousands of products and allow manufacturers to use the BPI certification mark to demonstrate that what they’re selling can, in fact, be composted.

The problem for Canadian dog owners is that Canadian and American rules are different. BPI explained to Asparagus in an email that “Pet Waste Bags aren’t currently accepted by most commercial composters in the United States, so BPI Certification for Pet Waste Bags is limited to Canada, where those types of products are commonly accepted by curbside composting programs.” This means that dozens of brands of poop bags that wouldn’t be approved in the US can be labelled as “compostable” in Canada.

Generally speaking, “compostable” plastics such as poop bags are made mainly of polybutylene adipate terephthalate, or PBAT. This polymer is synthesized from fossil fuels, though research suggests it could be derived from biomass in future. It is combined with plastic-alternative materials such as polylactic acid (PLA)—typically made from fermented plant starch obtained from plants like corn, cassava, sugarcane, or potato—to toughen them up while retaining the promised biodegradability.

The issue is, although PLA is considered to be compostable in precisely controlled industrial conditions, it is not compostable in home composts or landfills. One 2012 study suggests that in a landfill setting, it could take 100-plus years for PLA to complete the chemical process needed to just start biodegrading.

That problem seems to exist for most “compostable” plastics. Although they will usually degrade, sometimes in only a few years, the degradation relies on the plastic being disposed of under just the right conditions. The moisture of the compost environment, the temperature, and even the size of chopped-up particles that the bags have been reduced to all affect the composting process.

There are currently no international standards or guidelines for home-composting conditions, but companies from many countries—including some from Canada—use the Austrian “OK compost HOME” certification, which defines polymers as home-compostable if at least 90% are degraded within 12 months at ambient temperatures of 20–30°C.

Another issue is the release of microplastics from “compostable” plastics. While research is still being carried out on this, one 2021 study of PBAT in an aquatic environment found that PBAT released “a much larger quantity of plastic fragments/particles” than did LDPE, the plastic commonly used for food wraps, grocery bags, and industrial packaging.

All of this may explain why, as of 2023, BC has stopped allowing items labelled “compostable plastic” to be put in any compost. The Government of BC webpage on the issue states, “[T]hese plastics are regularly removed from composting and recycling facilities and are sent to landfills.”

Disposal dilemma

So you’ve picked up poop in a bag that is more-or-less compostable. Now what do you do with it? As is often the case with waste disposal, the challenge is that you’re trying to dispose of two different materials that need different handling. And you’re trying to do that within the specific rules and procedures put in place by your local municipality.

The starting point with dog waste is your local municipality’s recommendations. A 2019 City of Vancouver Engineering Services memorandum examining its dedicated dog-waste disposal regime (namely, the red bins located in dog parks) cites a report saying that the city has between 32,000 and 56,000 dogs. At the US Environmental Protection Agency’s estimated average of ⅓ kg of waste per dog per day, that comes to between approximately 4,000 and 7,000 metric tonnes of poop heading to local landfills every year.

Although few Vancouver dog-owners know it, the City of Vancouver launched a pilot program in 2016 mentioning the option of emptying your dog poop into your toilet, so that it can be handled by the local waste-treatment system. Your empty poop bags can then go into your household trash can.

The reason for flushing is simple, according to Dr. Love-Ese Chile, a bioplastics researcher: when dog feces go to landfill, they don’t properly compost.

“Dog waste often contains a lot of moisture,” Chile explains. “In the non-oxygen environments in many landfills, it will degrade in an anaerobic way to form methane and water.” That methane ends up being released as a greenhouse gas, which adds to climate problems.

Every plastic poop bag has to be opened and emptied out by hand to separate the bag from the waste.

However, confusingly for dog-owners, the signs at most Vancouver dog parks only remind owners that they are responsible for picking up after their dogs, and even the parks participating in the pilot project make no mention of flushing dog waste.

A 2019 memo to Vancouver City Council regarding the City’s red bins for dog waste raised some significant issues, not the least of which is that every plastic poop bag has to be opened and emptied out by hand to separate the bag from the waste. After some processing, the waste goes to the local sewage-treatment plant, and the bags—compostable or not—to the landfill. Perhaps unsurprisingly, a 2023 follow-up memo on this process notes that the City’s call for companies interested in carrying out the poop-bag-emptying process “received no feasible responses…from anybody willing or capable of dealing with this volume of waste.”

Municipalities are still working on creating good systems for handling dog feces, with little consistency from one place to another. As a dog owner, you might do better to check the resources at the Enviro Pet Waste Network. Their aim is to provide easy-to-understand, science-based information for pet owners.

The scoop on the poop

So as a dog owner, what should I be doing? If I flush the dog poop down the toilet, I’m reducing landfill waste as much as possible. If the bags are “compostable,” even better. Aside from microplastics, the “compostable” plastic bags are still greener than plastic bags made entirely from petroleum products.

What I can’t do, though, is mix my dog waste, or my compostable poop bags, with my regular compost pile. Anything containing animal waste should be kept separate from our food gardens, and that includes compost.

One option that the City of Vancouver suggests is that you create a separate compost pit just for dog feces. Detailed instructions can be found at cityfarmer.org—but before you dig a 3-foot-deep hole in the back of your garden plot, take the time to read through dog-owners’ experiences on Reddit or in gardening forums. For everyone who loves their handy dog-waste compost pit, there’s also someone who finds it unwieldy, smelly, or just not effective as a way to compost poop.

Although it’s possible to successfully compost poop, the reality is that it’s not the same as tossing your potato peels in the compost bucket. You’ll need grass cuttings or other plant material—and probably septic-tank starter—to get things working, and your success will depend on the specifics of your soil, climate conditions, and your dog’s breed, size, and diet.

Regardless of how you dispose of the actual dog poop, every dog-owner has to judge for themselves whether a little plastic bag is as green as they want to be. If not, maybe a wooden spoon and an old yogurt container is a better choice.

 

Dog Radar

Published: Popula.com
February 13, 2019
1233 words

Dogs in SnowJanuary 7, 2019
Vancouver, Canada

On Monday it was raining in North Vancouver. In January it’s always raining in North Van.

I climbed into my rain gear and hiking boots, and collected my lunch, phone, travel mug of coffee, and wallet. With the phone attached to the dash, and the day’s first podcast lined up (the Archers, a long-running BBC soap opera) I checked my schedule and pulled my indestructible Ford Ranger pick-up truck out onto the road.

Like most writers I have always had a day job: I co-own a dog-walking company called Four Legs Good, and take groups of dogs out for off-leash trail hikes in the mountains outside of Vancouver.

(Read More)

A Dog With No Name

Published: Black Cat White Dog News (PDF)
March 2013
775 words

See the lovely dog riding beside me in my truck? Do you know her name? I don’t.  I had just finished loading six dogs into my truck after an hour and a half on the trails.  This happy girl became an extra passenger.

I met her as she wandered down Millstream Road in West Vancouver, following her favorite mail carrier.  He even knew where she lived, so I tried to take her home, but the house was locked, and no-one answered the door.

Finally I dropped her off at the West Vancouver SPCA.  All in all this little girl cost me an hour or more of my time, a side trip from the British Properties down to Park Royal, and her owners the time and expense of recovering her.  Plus who knows how much worry when they found that she was gone. All for the sake of a five dollar name tag.

As a commercial dog walker I’m handling dogs all of the time.  And like most other walkers, I also wind up taking care of lost dogs on a regular basis.  Whether it’s the time of day, or the truck, or just a positive doggy “vibe”, you can bet that the dog that’s been wandering your neighbourhood all afternoon will come up to me and say “Hi! I’m lost! Please take me home!” And truly, I’m delighted to do it, but first I have to know who she is and how to find her owners.

If you own a dog it needs a collar.  A collar that’s around his or her neck, and fastened securely.  And on that collar you need a name tag, with the puppy name, and the phone number to call when I find her. Yes your dog has the proper municipal license tag, and possibly a rabies tag as well. He or she is likely micro-chipped  and tattooed to boot, but none of these are much use to me, or to most people who might meet your dog on the street.  What we really want is your phone number so that we can bring Rover home.

Now, about that collar.  It has to be on the dog.  All the time.  Yes, I know that Fluffy likes to lounge about sans collar at home, but he’s just not organized enough to put it back on before leaving.

I’ll repeat: the collar has to be on the dog. All the time. Just because your dog is at home – even if he or she is inside the house, with the doors locked and the alarm set – you should still assume that a Great Escape is imminent, and leave the collar on.

Having your dog escape is not a reflection on you, or your worth as a dog owner.   Sooner or later every dog finds a reason to wander off, chase a squirrel, check out the neighbor’s garbage.  It’s a dog thing, like shedding, and drooling, and snatching that piece of toast of the kitchen table when your back is turned.

Our poster girl? She wasn’t wearing a collar or tags, but she was wearing a electric fence “shock” collar.  Was it turned off? Were the batteries dead? Was she just happy to ignore it as she dashed off of her property?  I have no idea, but it didn’t slow her down.

Nine times out of ten when we find a lost dog it’s slipped away from home – through the back door, under the fence – you would be amazed how many ways a dog can escape.  Trust me. My own dog has been known to sneak out of the house and go play in Princess Park.

As an owner your obligation is to expect it, and be prepared.  It’s good to check your fences and fix holes.   It’s good to teach your dog recall, and encourage her to respect boundaries.  But it’s also good to plan for the worst – just the way you would with a young child. The dogs that we find are only a block or less from home,  and half the time the dog owner is at home too, but there’s no way we can know that.

The first step is always to look for a name tag, and call the owner. So do yourself, your dogs, and your local dog walkers a big favour and add a tag saying “My Name is Fang, and my phone number is 555-1212.”

Special hint: If your dog does get lost while you’re hiking the North Shore trails you can ask any commercial dog walker for help – we’ll spread the word to everyone walking that day to keep an eye out.