The “New Era Compost Biosa” has been supplied by Suffolk-based The Composting Company, and was developed in Denmark. The product has been on the market in the US, Scandanavia and Germany for the last few years.
” If the product can help to eliminate odour across industry it has to be a good thing.“
– Charlie Trousdell, TJ Composting Group
The product comes premixed, is 100% organic and contains micro-organisms which aim to help suppress disease, improve soil structure and soil health rather than simply conditioning the soil.
Charlie Trousdell, managing director of TJ Composting Group Ltd, which produces approximately 50,000 tonnes of compost a year, has been experimenting with the product on one of the company's sites in Swanley, Kent. He said: “Traditionally turning the windrow is an energy intensive process, by using the product we hope to be able to reduce the amount of turns to make decent compost.”
Mr Trousdell said his company would be able to determine the effectiveness of the Biosa product when it started screening the compost in approximately 12 weeks' time.
Odourless
In addition to its ability at speeding up the composting process, the developers of the Biosa product claim that when the product is sprayed onto the compost it starts to combat the build up of anaerobic decay, eliminating any unpleasant odours. This feature that could help composting operations established near residential areas.
Mr Trousdell said: “In terms of the odour, it seems to have worked quite effectively. We tested it out with onion waste and so far there has been no detectable odour from the windrow. Although we don’t really have a massive odour problem, if the product can help to eliminate odour across industry it has to be a good thing.”
Lincolnshire-based Mid-UK Recycling has also been using the Biosa product since February this year.
As a purchasing incentive, the Composting Company have offered a money back trial scheme until 31 July 2006.
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