The open days at WRG's Gowy composting facility near Chester was one of 50 different events which were held in the UK this week to raise awareness about composting.
School children and the public visited Gowy to see how green waste is turned into compost. The site processes 12,000 tonnes of green waste a year from Cheshire homes and WRG processes around 200,000 tonnes of green waste country-wide each year.
Chris Griffiths, WRG north western division’s compost facilities manager said: “The initiative has been a success. The government has imposed statutory objectives on local authorities to improve their waste recycling rates, and green waste composting is an excellent way of helping councils to meet their targets. By seeing for themselves the processes involved, the public can understand better how they can play their part.”
WRG north western division processed 36,000 tonnes of green waste in 2000 and manages 17 civic amenity sites on behalf of Cheshire County Council. The council has introduced a “Good Life Scheme” at its civic amenity sites to encourage composting. Under the scheme, members of the public are given a voucher for soil improver in exchange for their clean garden waste.
Composting Awareness Week was launched on Monday by Darren Johnson, of the Greater London Authority, who said: “Raising awareness about composting is not only important as it will significantly reduce the burden on landfill but it helps protect biodiversity too. Composting will play an increasingly important role as we move towards managing our wastes more sustainably.”
Composting Awareness Week is a Canadian initiative which began in 1995. It is now being annually promoted during the first week of May in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom and Ireland.
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