Waste is good news for greener farming in Herefordshire (From Hereford Times)

Waste is good news for greener farming in Herefordshire

8:00am Saturday 6th February 2010

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WASTE is being turned into fertiliser in Herefordshire with a lot of organic matter being returned to the land.

Two companies have got together to turn the disposal of waste into an environmentally friendly activity, preventing huge amounts being tipped into landfill sites.

M S and E M Patrick of Marlbrook, near Leominster, is an expert in waste disposal and is now leading the way in a new enterprise to ensure that disposal actually means turning it into a useful product.

The company has linked up with E & J Solutions of Leominster where director John Davies, an agronomist and farmer, says: “There is no such thing as a waste product, only a resource in the wrong place.”

They work with a huge number of clients and Patricks has long collected unwanted products such as poultry shed washings, chocolate, vegetable processing waste, preserves and brewing waste from premises in several counties, to be disposed of.

Some, called clean waste, and with the approval of the Environment Agency, has been spread directly onto farm land.

But much of it goes into landfill sites – and that is what is changing.

Patricks, with the help of Defra and the Rural Enterprise Scheme adminstered by Herefordshire Council, has purchased a macerator screener that separates out any foreign material such as plastic from the waste making it suitable for land application.

It has been installed at Marlbrook and is now fully operational and means that 90 per cent of organic matter waste the firm now collects can be recycled to farms.

Patricks has also invested in a new transfer station allowing it to handle 100,000 gallons of liquid waste for recycling.

“Our passion here is to create a sustainable system of waste management which is right for our customers and right for the environment,” said the company’s Mike Patrick.

E & J Solutions, through John Davies, is working with Patricks to encourage and help farmers to use the new liquid fertiliser.

He is on hand to advise which of the products are best for a particular crop in a particular location and to obtain permissions and exemptions required by law to allow it to be spread.

“All waste applied to the land can only be done under a permit issued by the Environment Agency, relating specific waste to a specific block of land,” he explained.

He says the fertiliser will supply nitrogen, phosphate and potash in varying quantities as well as suphur, calcium and other micronutrients and claims it could save farmers from £120 to £170 a hectare.

E & J Solutions also supplies and develops feasibility schemes to local farmers building anaerobic digesters on-farm, using their own organic material waste and crops to supply heat, gas, electricty and ultimately fertiliser for their own farms.

Excess energy generated is also sold into the

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