It is easy to pick out Dartmouth’s orange trash bags in the heaps of waste at Crapo Hill Landfill. The bags are not much different than ordinary ones, but cost $1 or $2 per bag. The bags are part of a system in which residents pay per unit of waste discarded rather than through a fixed fee or property tax.

Since the orange bags have become available, waste has been reduced by 50 percent, according to the Greater New Bedford Regional Refuse Management District, which serves Dartmouth and New Bedford.

To teach more about alternative forms of waste disposal and more, officials shared recycling and composting at the Dartmouth Cultural Center on June 29.

Food waste is the largest contributor to landfills in Massachusetts and one of the easiest for residents to cut back on. It can be as simple as eating leftovers and not letting food go bad.

Waste Production Manager Marissa Perez-Dormitzer and recycling assistant Meg Hebert believe that composting is a sure fire way to reduce and repurpose food waste.

“If you go to the store and buy [compost], you’re also buying a plastic bag, and you don’t know exactly what went in it,” Hebert said. “Doing your own home composting is so awesome. All the bugs and worms do all the work for us.”

Compost adds nutrients back to the soil.

The Refuse Management District sells compost bins at the facility, located at 300 Samuel Barnet Blvd, New Bedford, and has free compost available for pick up.

Hebert and Perez-Dormitzer note that the compost produced at the facility is composed of yard waste residents give them to pick up, so it may not be the most pure.

When composting, it is important to balance food waste with yard waste so the compost does not attract animals and can properly break down. They explained that it is important to load up on “brown stuff,” like leaves and small twigs in a compost bin.

For residents who don’t want to make their own compost, they can bring yard waste to Dartmouth Public Works located at, 759 Russells Mills Road, Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday from 7:30 a.m. to 3:15 p.m. and Saturday 7:30 a.m. to 2:45 p.m. People who wish to deposit their yard waste to Public Works must have a transfer station sticker.

Textile waste is also filling up the landfill. Recently, it was added to the MassDEP Waste Bans list of things residents cannot throw away, so all unwanted clothing must be donated in some capacity.

In 2016, the School Committee took on this issue, welcoming Bay State Textiles donation bins to the parking lots of public schools in town. The schools get a rebate for each pound collected.

Since March of 2016, over 1,216,480 pounds of textile waste have been donated, earning the schools more than $60,824.

Another option to reduce textile waste is to tailor clothing or buy used. Bushwood Tailors Opportunity Shop, located at 127 W. Rodney French Blvd. Suite 41-A 1st Floor, New Bedford, specializes in these types of “slow fashion.”

Claudia DeSouza-Baptista, owner of Bushwood Tailors said she opened her shop to “find creativity in sustainability and to encourage sustainability in the clothing and fashion world.”

Hebert and Perez-Dormitze explained that textile disposal takes up space in landfills, but also uses huge amounts of water to be created. They said a pair of jeans takes about 1,800 gallons of water to create.

Anyone is invited to deposit textile waste, including ripped, stained or damaged clothing, bedding or stuffed animals to the donation bins around town. Transfer stickers are available at Public Works Monday through Friday, 7:30 – 3:00pm. Stickers are also available at the Dartmouth Transfer Station starting July 6th, on Tuesdays and Thursdays.