BioCycle World :: BioCycle, Advancing Composting, Organics Recycling & Renewable Energy

BioCycle World

BioCycle November 2004, Vol. 45, No. 11, p. 6

CALL FOR PAPERS: COMPOSTING MORTALITIES
AND SLAUGHTERHOUSE RESIDUALS
Options for disposal of mortalities (animal carcasses) and slaughterhouse waste are becoming more limited and costly, due to closure of rendering plants, landfill restrictions or availability, and the impracticality of incineration, especially following disease outbreaks and natural disasters that can generate large quantities of carcasses. The state of Maine has been faced with this situation, prompting officials there to organize a "state of the knowledge" workshop — Composting Mortalities and Slaughterhouse Residuals — in May 2005 in Portland, Maine. The tentative dates are May 24-25. State agencies involved in workshop planning are the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Environmental

Protection and the State Planning Office. Cosponsors include BioCycle and the Cornell Waste Management Institute.
Themes to be addressed during the two day workshop, which will include field demonstrations of composting options, are: Rendering costs and availability; Mortality management; Biosecurity on farms; Emergency preparedness; Response to natural disasters that cause mass casualties; Disease outbreaks in livestock and wildlife; Disposition of composted end product; Research findings and needs; Public policy and regulations; and Marine mammal beachings. The workshop will be organized to maximize discussion and information exchange among speakers and participants.
Abstracts for presentations related to these themes should be submitted to: Bill Seekins, Maine Department of Agriculture, 28 SHS, Augusta, ME 04333; bill.seekins@maine.gov. Abstracts for posters are being accepted as well. The deadline for submissions is January 15, 2005.

OLD CELL PHONES AND COMPUTERS ADD UP TO
LOTS OF NEW TROUBLE
Based upon reports from recycling companies, while the number of cell phones being recovered is rising, the total pales compared to the total being thrown away. Some 100 million will be discarded in the U.S. this year, while only five million will be recycled or refurbished. At least 25 million will end up in the trash while 60 percent to 70 percent will be saved in drawers. In 2003, 277 million new cell phones were sold to replace older ones worldwide, says The Wall Street Journal. That number is expected to rise more than 50 percent this year to 420 million. The replacement cycle has dropped to 18 to 24 months. It’s also noted that in the U.S., there are no federal regulations requiring that cell phones and other household electronic devices be recycled. In early October, the Rechargeable Battery Recycling Corporation and Radio Shack launched a cell phone recycling campaign. Phones collected through Call2Recycle™ will be refurbished and resold when possible. One dollar of each sale will be donated to a missing children’s charity. For details, see www.call2recycle.org.
A study by a San Francisco nonprofit called CompuMentor concludes that adding a few years of life to computers by refurbishing them is five to 20 times more energy efficient than recycling. Donating computers could help meet demand for 28 million computers by schools and low-income families. However, CompuMentor estimates that 13 percent of PCs are recycled for materials and only 2 percent are reused. That’s the reason why so many directors of recycling programs are gearing up collection procedures for electronic waste.

COMPARING RECYCLING ACHIEVEMENTS IN NEW YORK
AND CALIFORNIA
From Gary Liss, formerly executive director of the California Resource Recovery Association, comes these comments on New York City’s decisions for a 20-year recycling contract and $25 million processing plant investment. (See "New Recycling Era For NYC," October 2004 BioCycle.)
"While New York City remained mired in the politics of wasting, more than 60 percent of California jurisdictions reviewed by the State met or exceeded the State’s 50 percent waste diversion goal, with some achieving diversion rates as high as 91 percent, and others adopting Zero Waste as a goal. The recycling industry in California now employs over 85,000 people, and produces $10 billion worth of goods and services annually.
"New York City has just moved a dramatic step forward to catch up with the Golden State with its new long-term recycling agreement. By contracting on a long-term basis with an independent recycler without any ties to landfills, NYC has learned that recycling can be more economic than they had previously imagined. The new contract gets the price signals right so that recycling is rewarded and wasting discouraged; in the new contract, there are also incentives to add materials and develop higher value markets.
"NYC hopefully has learned that it can waste less, recycle more, create more jobs and build a more sustainable city by harnessing the forces of the marketplace in this way. I hope that they’ll take that lesson to heart, and see how much better they can do by adopting Zero Waste as a goal, as outlined in the Citizens Plan for Zero Waste in New York City earlier this year. In the world of solid waste, you get what you ask for!"

INCREASING PLANT RESISTANCE TO PESTS
THROUGH COMPOST APPLICATIONS
Writing in the Fall 2004 Bulletin of the Organic Farming Research Foundation, Jane Sooby, Technical Program Coordinator, explains that many reports in the scientific literature indicate that plants receiving compost or compost tea applications have lower incidence of disease than plants not receiving compost. In other studies, scientists conducting genomic works on plants have uncovered complex cascades of metabolic release that are stimulated when plants detect specific molecules that signal "pathogen" to them. Ask Sooby: "Is this protective mechanism somehow triggered by applications of compost and compost tea, or is a different mechanism involved that accomplishes the same result? What characteristics of compost and compost tea stimulate the plant immune response? Can composts and compost tea be "designed" to stimulate maximal plant immune response by manipulating feedstocks, preparation method, or microbial composition of the finished product?"
At the BioCycle West Coast Conference in San Francisco, March 7-9, 2005, Sooby and other compost researchers will provide data to answer these and other critical questions concerning compost applications. For a preliminary agenda and registration details, visit www.biocycle.net

VICTOR BROWN — PIONEER OF MSW RECYCLING/ COMPOSTING SYSTEMS
On September 13, 2004, Victor Brown died at the age of 91. In 1963, he cofounded the Metropolitan Resource Conversion Corp. (Metro Waste) to develop mechanized systems for the automated separation and processing of MSW. Metro-Waste built and operated MSW cocomposting plants in Largo and Gainesville, Florida and in Houston, Texas. In 1975, he became president of Resource Conversion Systems, Inc. in Houston, and was the inventor and co-inventor of 13 patents including design of a high-rate trough composting system. In 1990, Mr. Brown was inducted into the Waste Age Hall of Fame in recognition for his contribution to the advancement of recycling technology.

HOW MANY ECOPRODUCTS CAN YOU FIND IN JAPAN?
The Sixth Annual Ecoproducts 2004 Exhibition will be held from Dec. 9 to 11, 2004 at the Tokyo International Exhibition Center, or "Tokyo Big Sight," in Ariake, Tokyo. Its aim is to accelerate the expansion of green markets by exhibiting environmentally friendly products and services. The three day event is one of the largest of its kind, and is expected to draw 450 corporations and more than 150,000 visitors. Check out www.vcc. ne.jp/eco2004/ec2004_en.pdf.

WEST LONDON COMPOSTING MOVES AHEAD WITH
CURBSIDE KITCHEN FOOD RESIDUALS
West London Composting (WLC) — the first recycling center in England modeled on advanced European standards — has signed an agreement with the London Borough of Harrow to process daily deliveries of green and household kitchen residuals including cardboard from its curbside collections. Designed to support Harrow Council’s kitchen recycling trial in conjunction with selected households, WLC will compost kitchen scraps including fruit, vegetables, meat and bones together with green waste — in a bid to help the borough reach government recycling targets to increase the amount of waste recycled to 25 percent by 2005/2006.
The deal with Harrow Council — explains Kit Strange of the Resource Recovery Forum — is designed to meet with the proximity principle of the EC Framework Directive on Waste, as incorporated in the National Waste Strategy. The principle states that waste should generally be managed as near as possible to its place of production, because transporting waste itself has an environmental impact.
At WLC’s £2 million recycling facility at Highview Farm in Harefield, West (London) refuse collection vehicles are first weighed on a weigh-bridge before the waste is discharged into a reception building. The material is then processed in a Crambo shredder. From here it is transported into one of eight vessels that comprise "barrier one." Each vessel has a capacity of 150 metric tons.
The waste remains in this controlled environment between seven and 11 days, during which time the batch will have achieved a temperature of 60ºC for two consecutive days, in line with Government guidelines. The material is then transferred to "barrier two" (comprising eight further vessels), and the process is repeated, before being transported to an open windrow composting facility where it remains for up to ten weeks, depending on the end market requirement.
The trapezoid-shaped windrows are turned at regular intervals in order to add oxygen and mix the material. While some materials such as highly active organic waste can produce an unpleasant smell, the sophisticated processing techniques employed by WLC, are specifically designed to eliminate any odors. Once matured, the material is screened before being subjected to quality controls. The end result is compost that is friable, moist and odorless, suitable for a wide variety of individual or commercial requirements, concludes Kit Strange.

N.C. VASUKI NAMED SOLID WASTE ASSOCIATION
INTERNATIONAL PRESIDENT
N. C. Vasuki, CEO of the Delaware Solid Waste Authority and former member of the BioCycle editorial board, was elected president of the International Solid Waste Association for 2004-2006. Prior to his election in Rome, Italy last month, Vasuki had served as SWANA president for two terms in 1992 and 1993.