Upper Darby, PA Landscaping Rules: Composting (2026)

The only mention of composting in Upper Darby's Refuse Collection and Recycling article sits inside the leaf-waste separation rule at Section 461-20B: residents must separate leaf waste from refuse and recyclables and store it until collection unless such persons or entities have otherwise provided for the composting of such leaf waste. That clause is an exemption, not a composting program: it lets a household that composts its own leaves, defined by Section 461-15 as leaves from trees, bushes and other plants, garden residue, chipped shrubbery and tree trimmings, skip the separation and curbside set-out requirement entirely for that material.

The code does not add any bin standard, enclosure, setback from a property line, or registration step for backyard composting anywhere in this article; it is silent on how the compost must be contained, meaning a resident relies on general nuisance and property-maintenance provisions elsewhere in the Township Code, not this section, for anything like odor or pest complaints. Because the exemption only reaches leaf waste as narrowly defined, with grass clippings already outside that definition under Section 461-15, composting food scraps or grass clippings in the same bin is not something this clause addresses one way or the other; the exemption's text covers leaf waste alone.