Press

Published: Monday, October 13, 2003, Everett Herald

Gore-Tex turns dirt into gold

By Eric Fetters
Herald Writer

EVERETT -- Composting doesn't seem like a high-tech process. Indeed, transforming decomposing plant and food materials into enriched soil occurs in nature without the help of anything but worms and microscopic organisms.

But putting a huge Gore-Tex blanket over a compost pile can speed up the process, which is important when you're dealing with tons of yard and food waste.

That's essentially what Cedar Grove Composting is doing at its large facility in south King County, and it plans to use the same innovation at a new site on Smith Island in Everett.

A composting plant in Snohomish County would save Cedar Grove time and money spent on transportation. At present, the composting company hauls yard waste collected here by trash hauler Waste Management Northwest to Cedar Grove's plant and headquarters in Maple Valley. The composted soil then is hauled back to this area for sale at local nurseries and other businesses.

"We're spending too much time on the road, hauling stuff down here and hauling stuff back," said Jerry Bartlett, general manager for Cedar Grove. "The drive is just killing us."

The new composting facility would be on the northwest side of Smith Island. Cedar Grove has an option to purchase 109 undeveloped acres there, with about 30 acres of that planned for the facility. The rest of the usable land could be developed for other uses, Bartlett said.

Additionally, the company is proposing to build a public walking trail along Steamboat Slough in the areas that cannot be developed because of environmental rules.

The Smith Island site would mark a return to Snohomish County for the company. In 1997, Cedar Grove bought out Phoenix Composting in Arlington, but closed and sold that property in 2000. Ironically, Cedar Grove felt that site was too small for its old composting methods.

"That site probably still would be fine if we knew about this technology," Bartlett said, referring to the Gore-Tex covers.

In use in Europe since 1995, the covers only came into use on this continent last year, said Ed Schneider, spokesman for Delaware-based W.L. Gore & Associates Co., which makes Gore-Tex. Known for its water resistance and breathability, the fabric is widely used in outdoor clothing, medical equipment and industrial devices. That's the heart of the Gore's compost covers .

"The technology is the same," Schneider said. "It's the same principal applied for a different use."

Cedar Grove adopted the Gore-Tex covers after looking for ways to compost leftover food, Bartlett said. That required covering the material to kill off disease-causing organisms.

As it turned out, the specialized covers, in use since May at Cedar Grove, do much more. Because they help the compost piles reach temperatures of 170 to 180 degrees Fahrenheit, the natural breakdown of the materials is speeded up. Those temperatures also are high enough to kill off weed seeds and potentially harmful organisms.

In addition to holding in heat and moisture, which is beneficial, the covers hold in more than 90 percent of odors from the composting process. They also protect the piles against the weather.

To keep oxygen flowing through the pile, relatively small fans push air from vents placed in the concrete pad on which the pile rests. That takes much less energy than the older system, which basically sucks air through the compost pile.

Electronic probes stuck into the compost piles and connected to computers monitor the air flow and temperature and can control the fans.

"This system is about 95 percent more efficient than the old system," Bartlett said.

The result is that, using the covers, Cedar Grove can produce mature compost in 10 to 12 weeks, compared to a year using uncovered methods.

So far, Cedar Grove's Maple Valley facility is one of only three in North America using the Gore-Tex covers, Bartlett said.

Assuming the Smith Island facility is approved by the city of Everett, construction could begin this winter and composting could start by April or May, Bartlett said. The facility would employ four or five people initially, not counting truck drivers coming to the site, he added.

The new facility also would include a truck scale and a tipping building, where yard waste and other material is brought into the plant; a grinder, which chews up branches and other larger material into smaller pieces; and a screening machine, which sorts out any final large pieces or trash from the mature compost. Bartlett said Cedar Grove would spend millions to prepare the site for the composting operation.

"In order to do this right, you have to make a substantial investment," he said.

Composting is big business for Cedar Grove, whose 14-year-old Maple Valley location is the largest yard waste composting site in the United States. It processes about 195,000 tons of material a year. The family-owned company makes money by charging a fee to trash haulers and individuals who bring yard waste into the plant and from sales of its popular compost and potting soil blends.

The Smith Island plant would be considerably smaller than Maple Valley's, processing about 41,000 tons a year at the beginning. Still, that's enough to handle nearly all the yard waste collected by Waste Management Northwest in Snohomish County, Bartlett said. There also would be room for some expansion.

"That really depends on Everett and Snohomish County. If they start collecting the post-consumer food waste along with yard waste, we'll build it out faster," Bartlett said.

Jeff Kelley-Clarke, Snohomish County's director of solid waste, said the new facility may help to boost composting by county residents.

"Our solid waste program has supported composting of solid vegetative material, especially yard waste, for a long time. But there has been a capacity problem," he said.

Kelley-Clarke said he's also "cautiously supportive" of composting food waste, although he would like to see more data about how well the Gore-Tex covers handle potential problems with that material.

The city of Everett has scheduled an Oct. 30 public hearing for Cedar Grove's proposal.

"It's a really great site. It's not right next to any houses. It's in a really good wind direction, and with this technology, we think it's a win-win," Bartlett said.

Reporter Eric Fetters:
425-339-3453 or
fetters@heraldnet.com.