Composting in Strathmore’s future
Shannon LeClair
Times Reporter
Colin Huxted of H&H Huxted Enterprises has never been shy about his desire to decrease his, and the town’s, carbon footprint. On May 7 Huxted spoke before town council about his plans and hopes to bring composting to town.
“I believe it is something that we need to do here, something that should be here, it’s time for it,” said Huxted.
What you can do with compost is incredible, said Huxted; there could be a 25 per cent reduction of waste in the landfill. Huxted’s already collects quite a bit of compost material, grass, sod, tree leaves and so on.
Alberta environment has three different classes of compost sites, if you are composting less than 100 metric tonnes a year you are not required to have all of the permits.
Huxted said the town will be under the 100 tonne limit, but it will result in a savings of $108 a tonne in the landfill.
“We would like to start a little bit of a pilot program and set it up so we can start to compost this material,” said Huxted.
“If this pilot project works, within a couple of years we can move into a level 2 and we will save the town hundreds of thousands of dollars.”
Huxted has no doubt that the project will work, and said when the product is finished it could be used in green spaces around town and can help save the water and feed the plants.
Huxted’s will supply all of the equipment, and may need a little help from the town once in a while in terms of equipment, but doesn’t see that happening very often.
“There will be no cost to the town, and if we fail, which we won’t, but if we fail you lose nothing, you just lose a lot of hard work and sweat that we put in, but I’m not going to lose. I am very confident that with his help (Bruce) we can make it work,” said Huxted.
He is looking at the possibility of purchasing a machine that will pulverize the glass and turn it back into sand that can be used in various ways around town. He also suggests Huxted’s will be getting a little more creative to find uses for some of the plastics for which there is currently no market. There are also plans to accept wood and make mulch. Huxted’s will even dye it a number of different colours so if someone wants blue mulch, they can make it.
Huxted’s request to the town was to lease the three acres, and he will compost, look after the cement, load the asphalt and maintain the site at no cost to the town.
“I’m enthralled, I’m enthusiastic and I’m very excited about this whole thing,” said Councillor Bob Sobol.
“This is one of the most exciting initiatives that I have seen come forward and I am just so supportive of Bob’s motion and of the future possibilities,” said Councillor Denise Peterson.
The rest of council echoed the same sentiments. Huxted was invited to bring a business proposal and outline to administration to look over so that recommendations and further details could be discussed about the future initiative. The matter should be back before council at the May 21 meeting.