compost

Simple Compost Harvesting for Impatient Gardeners (video)

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oCA3UbLadE Here's a good MIgardener video showing how to sift through your compost heap. His pile is clearly past its thermophilic phase, as it's cooled down enough that it's filled with pill bugs and earthworms...these are the critters that turn your material from compost to finished compost, by further breaking it all down.  This phase is essentially as long as you want it to be. His trick with using the pitchfork to separate out all the twigs and non-composted material seems to work well for him.  I made a compost sieve for screening mine, but a pitchfork would make a great preliminary screening as well. He mentions nutrients leaching out into the soil... a simple method for helping prevent this is to start your compost heap with at least six…

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Kroger Converts Food Waste To Energy (article)

(original article found here: http://www.wasterecyclingnews.com/article/20130516/NEWS02/130519945/kroger-converts-food-waste-to-energy?utm_campaign=corpsustain_newsletter&utm_medium=corpsustain_email&utm_source=corpsustain_20130520&utm_content=article1) The Kroger Co. unveiled an anaerobic digestion system to convert food that can't be sold or donated into biogas that will help power its distribution center in Compton, Calif. The Cincinnati, Ohio-headquartered retailer expects the system will process more than 55,000 tons yearly of unsold organics and food processing effluent, roughly 150 tons per day. The energy produced will provide 20% of the energy needed by the distribution center, the company said in a news release. "Investing in this project is a good business decision for Kroger and, most importantly, an extraordinary opportunity to benefit the environment," Rodney McMullen, President and COO of The Kroger Co., said in a statement. "We want to thank Governor [Jerry] Brown and his team at CalRecycle and CalEPA, the…

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