El Paso, TX Landscaping Rules: Composting (2026)

010, starts by banning the sale or storage of manure within city limits and prohibiting use of manure or other organic material as fertilizer unless first composted, turned into a stabilized product through decomposition and stabilization of organic matter by biological action, as the section defines it. Subsection (C), Backyard Composting Allowed, is the residential carve-out: individuals may compost organic material generated by their own households, including kitchen waste (other than the prohibited items) and yard waste, provided it's conducted in a sanitary manner which prevents nuisance conditions that include, but are not limited to, those that attract vermin or create noxious odors.

Two hard limits apply. First, a categorical ban on certain feedstocks, meat scraps, dairy products, cooking oils such as lard, vegetable oil, and bacon grease, and pet feces may never go into an outdoor compost pile, because these materials attract rodents and create odor and pathogen problems the ordinance is designed to prevent. Second, a size cap, composting must be confined to an enclosed structure in an area not greater than fifty square feet for any given household, so open, unenclosed piles and anything larger than a standard backyard bin setup fall outside the ordinance's protection.

The city's Department of Environmental Services, through its director or a designee, is charged with enforcing this section, meaning complaints about smell, rodents, or oversized piles route through that department.