About 60 members of the Huntly community attended a community conference last night (27 May 2024) to discuss an application to buildan organic resource recovery and composting facility.
The conference, held at the Epson Huntly Recreational Reserve, gave EPA the opportunity to explain the application assessment process and gain a better understanding of community views and concerns that need to be considered in assessment of the application from Western Composting Technology Pty Ltd.
“It was a cold night so to get such a good turnout was evidence of the local interest in the proposed project,” EPA North West Regional Manager Paul Ratajczyk said.
“A lot of concern was expressed around odour and how that was proposed to be managed and that is certainly a key area for our assessment.”
Mr Ratajczyk said information gathered at the conference will now be collated and form part of the issues considered in the assessment process along with the 150 submissions already received.
Western Composting Technology organic resource recovery and composting facility
Western Composting Technology Pty Ltd (WCT) proposes to establish an organic resource recovery and composting facility at Lot 2 Wallenjoe Road, Huntly and compost up to 30,000 tonnes per annum of food organics and garden organics (FOGO) as well as commercial garden waste and food waste
Feedstock will be shredded and fed into one of four enclosed vessels, where it will remain for 8 to 12 days. Following pasteurisation, the feedstock material is formed into a windrow on the maturation pad. Typically, after 6 to 8 weeks, material in the window will be assessed and if deemed necessary it will be ground using a high-speed grinder. The material will be windrowed for an additional 6 to 8 weeks to complete maturation.
