Preston-based TEG Environmental has run the Sherdley Farm facility for three years as a model plant to test a range of organic waste mixes for customers. The extension means they can now continue with this work until 2019.
Dr Alan Heyworth, technical director of TEG, explained the work at Sherdley: “We might be approached by a company that produces shellfish waste which needs to be disposed of. We then do trials with them and work out the volume of say, straw or green waste that needs to be added to a measure of shellfish waste to produce compost.”
“The most unusual, to date, was citrus fruit residue from a fruit juice manufacturer,” he added.
TEG composts the blends in a thermophilic, in-vessel Silo-Cage system which it manufactures. It is designed to ensure high composting temperatures of over 70 degrees centigrade to destroy pathogens. TEG say there is nothing to stop a customer taking the knowledge of the mix to another compost facility supplier, but that the company could not guarantee it would work in another system.
The TEG process requires a small amount of power and does not generate dust or bio-aerosols, said Dr Heyworth. Over 14 days, the raw organic matter is broken down to a composted natural organic fertiliser. Several thousand tonnes of the product, known as 'E;nvirogrow', is sold to golf-courses, football clubs and racetracks around the country for 160 a tonne.
There have been more than 30 serious enquiries from waste producers in the UK and abroad about the Silo-Cage, say TEG, but many have been hampered by planning permission. However the company has recently successfully sold a facility to Swansea City Council due to be delivered early next year.
“There are unlikely to be any problems with this one as it will be on an existing waste management site,” said Dr Heyworth. “It would be ideal really if we could have more plants based at landfill sites and waste management sites to save the problems with planning.”
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