TJ Composting was formerly 90% owned by Petra Johnston, a private investor who acted as chair of the company, who is understood to have sold her stake in order to pursue other interests. The remaining was 10% owned by TJ managing director, Charlie Trousdell, who is also chair of the Association for Organics Recycling.
Countrystyle stressed that customer arrangements for the treatment of waste would continue to operate without interruption at sites and that both customers and staff would notice very little change other than site and vehicle rebranding.
The company has two existing in-vessel composting facilities, one in Sittingbourne, Kent and another in Parham, Suffolk, which can each handle 35,000 tonnes of organic waste a year. The acquisition will expand its composting operations to a more national basis and increase capacity by 150,000 tonnes-a-year – triple what it handles at present.
The open window system operating at the four former TJ Composting sites see organic material being matured outdoors for a minimum of 12 weeks, where material is rotated using open windrow turn methods used to speed up the composting process.
The acquisition sees Countrystyle take over TJ Composting's open-windrow facility in Swanley, Kent, where it is also hoping to receive planning permission to build a 46,000 tonne-a-year capacity dry anaerobic digestion facility (see letsrecycle.com story).
Most of the green and food waste that currently supplies the facilities comes from local authority civic amenity sites and trade material from landscapers, where it is then processed into nutrient rich compost. Once produced, the compost is supplied to many different genres of grounds maintenance contractors including gardeners, farmers, landscapers and horticulturists, as well as working in partnership local authorities.
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