Compost - large amounts
Last post 26-05-2008 12:55 PM by bunnywood. 13 replies.
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19/05/2008 05:05 PM
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- bunnywood
- 22 Mar 2005
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8
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My son has a vegetarian restaurant and pays huge amounts for waste removal. This is clearly bonkers. What methods could be used to compost this waste efficiently? There is a large amount of green waste - veg. and fruit peelings, old veg. and unused salad materials. There would also be eggshells, cooked veg, cardboard, tea-leaves etc. Some of the waste might have dairy food and bread or cereal in it, but the green waste at least could be kept separate. My concern is that there would be too much kitchen waste added at a time and also that any bin would fill up very quickly and then take ages to compost. Can anyone help, please?
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19/05/2008 05:09 PM
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Talk to the local council about refuse collection alternatives? Move the restaurant out to the sticks and set up a kitchen garden (extreme)?
Seems like there should be something, but I don't know what
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Ow! My most of me!
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19/05/2008 05:35 PM
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- bunnywood
- 22 Mar 2005
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8
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Thanks for your help - a kitchen garden sounds lovely - but the veggie restaurant needs lots of customers to keep afloat and very long hours and an early start make living away from the business impossible. The council doesn't offer a commercial alternative for waste disposal, but concentrates its efforts on creating rules and inspections for contractors who do - this in spite of very large business rates ...don't get me started! It seems to me that there's an awful waste going on here, but how to manage it I don't know. There must be someone doing it surely?
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19/05/2008 05:47 PM
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- sue1002
- Ipswich, Suffolk
- 06 Sep 2005
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5,200
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Are there any schools or allotments nearby? if there are I'm sure they would welcome the green waste for their compost bins/heaps. Perhaps your son could let his customers know that people could collect it for free for their home compost bins and he might gain a few extra customers, just a thought...
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19/05/2008 06:35 PM
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- Phot's-Moll
- The sunny South coast.
- 06 Jan 2007
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3,347
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If he's anywhere near me, I'll have it for my compost heap! If you or he are going to compost it yourselves, just add some straw, shredded paper or screwed up newspaper to the heap an it should rot down fine. Otherwise, Sue's suggestion of contacting local allotment holders is a good idea. The local horticultural society is another possibility. For a different solution - does anyone in the area keep goats? They'll eat all the green waste.
Whether you think you can do a thing, or think you cannot, you are right.
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19/05/2008 08:15 PM
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- bunnywood
- 22 Mar 2005
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Brilliant! Thank you so much for your suggestions. I'll get the staff to use 2 bins for a start and farm out the green waste among customers and local allotments. We can also do some ourselves using your suggestions for addition of dry stuff. Thanks - a project for the summer.
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20/05/2008 05:01 AM
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Two words -
Massive Wormery!
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Ow! My most of me!
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20/05/2008 03:25 PM
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- Phot's-Moll
- The sunny South coast.
- 06 Jan 2007
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3,347
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Yeah, but where will they get the massive worms?
Whether you think you can do a thing, or think you cannot, you are right.
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21/05/2008 05:40 PM
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How about...?
Erm...?
I've not thought this through
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Ow! My most of me!
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22/05/2008 12:54 PM
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- JamesA
- Peterborough
- 24 Aug 2006
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160
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Do you have a lot of cardboard/paper you could mix with it rather than recycling to make it less sludgy?
It's a shame Gordon Ramsey and other TV restaurants don't promote this kind of thing.
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22/05/2008 04:41 PM
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- bunnywood
- 22 Mar 2005
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Yes, we have plenty of newspaper and eggboxes - and they have a rabbit so there is a mix of straw, sawdust and rabbit poo. I'm thinking it would have to be in a covered bin in the garden - there's nowhere at the restaurant so it would have to be taken home every night. He couldn't deal with it all, obviously, but even a bit would be a start..
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26/05/2008 02:21 AM
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- Spadework
- 18 Oct 2007
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6
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Be careful - restaurant waste (in Scotland anyway) is classed as industrial waste and you need to be a licensed industrial waste disposal operator to remove it. I work in a hotel and that is what I found out when I made inquiries at the local council about taking home kitchen green waste for the compost heap.
However, as law abiding as I am, a holdall full every day did seem to find its way home...
I wouldn't advertise the fact that anyone could come and take your kitchen waste away. With the ever increasing jobsworths and PC bampots going around, you could find yourself & your son in a bit of bother.
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26/05/2008 12:53 PM
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He's right - some disgruntled employee or suchlike would dob you out - composting food waste regs. Boggy
Beware the bat-eared bogweevil
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26/05/2008 12:55 PM
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- bunnywood
- 22 Mar 2005
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Hah! I rather suspected there might be something of the sort in the rules. I know the inspectors are very high profile in the area. I did find a special Swedish machine on the net which would probably pass, but the insustrial version is £12000 pounds, and you have to put in wood pellets - how green is that! I think on the whole the bokashi method would be best just to reduce the waste a wee bit and make compost for our own use. But what a waste!
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