Dons' Dirt

DonTesla

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
Hey Folks, DonT here with an interesting development :)

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The bros and I have about 5 acres that we own / can use for composting, rinsing, amending and packaging the above .. literally dozens if not hundreds of tonnes of excess wood material, namely hog (bark with wood), clean natural sawdust, and wood chips, both decomposed and fresh..

There are different grades of sand around here as well. Sand if i haven't mentioned is endless and if we need aggregate there is a company in town that crushes rock.

Two provinces over I have screeners back hoes and a bagging machine ready to lease, and stores ready for product. I was going to do a little batch of fully amended soil and start selling the extra amendments as I was gonna buy big bulk amounts, but now this development of free material is making me rethink the strategy a bit..

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jumbo pine sawdust Bokashi, serious slab BioChar, and a collasal compost operation, coming up, folks :D

Perhaps a packaging plant too if we can get the green lights
 
fumble

fumble

Well-Known Member
Sounds great DonT! What an awesome opportunity. I have no doubt that whichever direction you decide to go with it you will be successful
 
DonTesla

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
Was lucky to get some aerials of the plant today thanks to my bro

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Air1.gif As you can see there is no shortage for us to play with!

Now we collect samples and send for tests in the next day or so, and do some more research on a few things.

Gonna be looking for space on the low, too, while we wait for those tests come back, so we can avoid using our own land if we can, which might be nice as one of the acreages is ready to go up for sale and could represent a solid $250k for my buddy

Hopefully we can talk someone into letting us convert it into a business property. I found one dude selling multiple 5 acre lots in the area so we may be able to find something else.

The company is an option too and probably the cheapest, but its nice to work from home in some extra privacy.
 
calliandra

calliandra

Well-Known Member
Wow that looks really big :shock:

I just found out that if you do anything that goes beyond backyard composting in Austria, you first have to secure the property as if it were a toxic waste dump - i.e. very expensive setup with thick insulated concrete, runoff filtering systems and all, in other words, regulations designed to deter small enterprise from taking business from the trash mafia...

Seems you don't have that over there - good luck! 8)
 
DonTesla

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
calliandra said:
Wow that looks really big :shock:

I just found out that if you do anything that goes beyond backyard composting in Austria, you first have to secure the property as if it were a toxic waste dump - i.e. very expensive setup with thick insulated concrete, runoff filtering systems and all, in other words, regulations designed to deter small enterprise from taking business from the trash mafia...

Seems you don't have that over there - good luck! 8)
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HUUUUUUUUGE!!! Sorry to hear about the bureaucracy there, Calliandra! From what I know, Austrain government is loose regarding their internet laws but looks like they make up for it by being extra stringent on the ground, shame shame. However Chris Stone would get around that by working with multiple people and their yards I bet. Hopefully they cant slow you down!
 
calliandra

calliandra

Well-Known Member
DonTesla said:
HUUUUUUUUGE!!! Sorry to hear about the bureaucracy there, Calliandra! From what I know, Austrain government is loose regarding their internet laws but looks like they make up for it by being extra stringent on the ground, shame shame. However Chris Stone would get around that by working with multiple people and their yards I bet. Hopefully they cant slow you down!
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They do try, at every corner. But I'm coming to accept it's part of the game :? ok not quite yet haha

Actually I've been told Germany is even worse; in Austria, at least you can do anything that isn't expressly forbidden, whilst there, everything is forbidden, unless expressly allowed :eyesmoke:

A friend of mine is currently trying to help a small-town mayor escape paying 15€ per cubic meter of landscaping cuttings to one of the trash magnates here (they in turn, re-sell to a biomass facility a ways off, so earn twice!).
You'd think, at 1m³ per week, no problem to just compost it themselves?
But no, the infrastructural regulations.
So now they're looking into chipping new material and adding it at the right C:N and humidity to bigass wormbins, and then encouraging the locals to take along the finished compost for free when they bring their garden debris for processing. Government by the people for the people. Fingers crossed! :D
 
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DonTesla

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
ShLUbY said:
i'll have my degree fall of '18. working towards it currently :)
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Excellent! So are you learning about what chemicals they use in different industries?! We are trying to ensure these products are safe this week. There are over 200 tests at the place who does the sawdust testing for this behemoth. Heavy metals, dusts, toxins, but 200 tests? thats more than I expected.. lol
 
DonTesla

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
calliandra said:
They do try, at every corner. But I'm coming to accept it's part of the game :? ok not quite yet haha

Actually I've been told Germany is even worse; in Austria, at least you can do anything that isn't expressly forbidden, whilst there, everything is forbidden, unless expressly allowed :eyesmoke:

A friend of mine is currently trying to help a small-town mayor escape paying 15€ per cubic meter of landscaping cuttings to one of the trash magnates here (they in turn, re-sell to a biomass facility a ways off, so earn twice!).
You'd think, at 1m³ per week, no problem to just compost it themselves?
But no, the infrastructural regulations.
So now they're looking into chipping new material and adding it at the right C:N and humidity to bigass wormbins, and then encouraging the locals to take along the finished compost for free when they bring their garden debris for processing. Government by the people for the people. Fingers crossed! :D
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They're even sticking it to the mayor, hey, wow. Getting paid to take a product that you can sell again, that is something.

Way to rally up and govern yourselves better, Austrian peoples. Co-op tradeoffs
 
DonTesla

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
So we got the green light on 45 000 metric tonnes today, a plot of 30-40 acres thats 30 to 50 feet deep, so the testing begins ..

I got a pic on the wrong phone so ill have to juggle and load a pic in the am, time for show and a nap, been a long day, already 5 am, nite all! :D
 
ShLUbY

ShLUbY

Well-Known Member
DonTesla said:
Excellent! So are you learning about what chemicals they use in different industries?! We are trying to ensure these products are safe this week. There are over 200 tests at the place who does the sawdust testing for this behemoth. Heavy metals, dusts, toxins, but 200 tests? thats more than I expected.. lol
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Im not sure how much of that in particular ill be learning. You know how these education systems can be... they only want you to know what THEY want you to know... know what i mean? But im looking forward to getting through the program. Its a place to start. In the fall i have plant physiology, ecological assesment, evolution, and entomology.
 
DonTesla

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
Entomology, cool! and eco assessment should be good, same with plant physio.. Either way I bet we will have some great work experience for you if not a wicked little position so you can pad your resume and use Jah as an interim position / job reference. We will be doing lots of work in enviro-organics.
 
DonTesla

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
calliandra said:
Ah I love it when lovely people come together to do lovely things! :bigjoint:
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Totally. The crazy thing is that we are potentially gonna be solving 2 problems at once... a vast amount natural environmental excess as well as a Canadian wide, somewhat worldwide shortage of easily available quality, organic amendments / mixes
 
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