OT Composting and why we are in the wrong business

9100 · Dec 9, 2018

We had to dispose of a dead tree so we cut it into manageable lengths and hauled it in a pickup to a composting operation. They charged $45 to take the wood and we unloaded ourselves. They will chip it up and leave it for nature to do its thing, then sell the mulch to people who pay to get it and haul it away.

Imagine how much money we could make if steel suppliers delivered steel and paid us to take it. We would turn it into chips which we would leave outside until they got good and rusty, then people would pay us for it and haul it away at no cost to us.

Bill

moonlight machine · Dec 9, 2018

9100 said:
We had to dispose of a dead tree so we cut it into manageable lengths and hauled it in a pickup to a composting operation. They charged $45 to take the wood and we unloaded ourselves. They will chip it up and leave it for nature to do its thing, then sell the mulch to people who pay to get it and haul it away.

Imagine how much money we could make if steel suppliers delivered steel and paid us to take it. We would turn it into chips which we would leave outside until they got good and rusty, then people would pay us for it and haul it away at no cost to us.

Bill

Capitalism. Supply - Demand Lots of dead trees. No one wants them.
You have to pay someone to take them. You are lucky they can sell the mulch, think what it would cost to get rid of the tree if there was no market for dead tree by products. If it was a yard tree no sawmill will touch it as someone may have driven a nail in it. I had a huge cedar tree that died, the local sawmill said they did not want it. I gave it away for fire wood.

ewlsey · Dec 9, 2018

There's a simple solution:

thermite · Dec 9, 2018

9100 said:
We had to dispose of a dead tree so we cut it into manageable lengths and hauled it in a pickup to a composting operation. They charged $45 to take the wood and we unloaded ourselves. They will chip it up and leave it for nature to do its thing, then sell the mulch to people who pay to get it and haul it away.

Imagine how much money we could make if steel suppliers delivered steel and paid us to take it. We would turn it into chips which we would leave outside until they got good and rusty, then people would pay us for it and haul it away at no cost to us.

Bill

It works even better with Oxygen Thieves and mis-applied protein.

Send them off to State or Federal Congresses or "white" houses, they convert money into hot air and toxic fertilizer at an astonishing rate.

Might be a while before anyone figures out how to benefit off the hot air or the toxins, but for-damned-sure it solves the curse of having surplus MONEY very reliably, yah?

Guest · Dec 9, 2018

Wood is very popular to burn for heat here, closest neighbor has a large wood burning steam system that will burn huge chunks of green wood. If you put a free for the taking truck load size you haul tree ad on Craigslist here it would gone pretty fast, supply and demand plain and simple.

dalmatiangirl61 · Dec 9, 2018

My plan for today is to drive up in the hills, chop some trees down, cut into manageable pieces and haul it home, how odd you would haul the tree away AND pay someone to take it.

9100 · Dec 9, 2018

Dualkit said:
Wood is very popular to burn for heat here, closest neighbor has a large wood burning steam system that will burn huge chunks of green wood. If you put a free for the taking truck load size you haul tree ad on Craigslist here it would gone pretty fast, supply and demand plain and simple.

We do that with most wood but this was cottonwood, lousy firewood. One time I had a large white oak branch to get rid of. I cut it into firewood lengths and put at the front of my parking lot. It sat there for weeks without a taker. Finally, I decided to split it and take it to my sister who has a fireplace. I quickly found that I could no longer swing a 12 pound sledge or a splitting maul overhead. I put a wedge on the surface grinder, grinding lengthwise to minimize friction, and sharpened it to a real knife edge. I could tap that into the side of the branch with a 2 pound hammer, which started the split and white oak goes easily once you get it started. It was a blistering hot summer day, so I split all of it, collected my tools, and went in the shop to rest and cool off. When I came out, the wood was gone.

Bill

Ox · Dec 9, 2018

moonlight machine said:
Capitalism. Supply - Demand Lots of dead trees. No one wants them.
You have to pay someone to take them. You are lucky they can sell the mulch, think what it would cost to get rid of the tree if there was no market for dead tree by products. If it was a yard tree no sawmill will touch it as someone may have driven a nail in it. I had a huge cedar tree that died, the local sawmill said they did not want it. I gave it away for fire wood.

Many years ago my one G-pa had bought some firewood already cut/split, and asked if I'd be over to help unload in the morning.
So I was there, and helped.
Once the we had it unloaded, the guy was paid, and left, I said to my G-pa:

"I think that's walnut..."

"Yeah, I think so too, but I didn't have the heart to say so."

Now kids today may not understand so much, but 35 yrs ago at least - walnut was VERY expensive wood!
Chance of a damaged blade may not have been nearly as concerning at that time.
These days it doesn't seem to be nearly as high dollar.

It seemed to burn fine.

--------------

Think Snow Eh!
Ox

thermite · Dec 9, 2018

9100 said:
I split all of it, collected my tools, and went in the shop to rest and cool off. When I came out, the wood was gone.

LOL! Well, I guess the attractiveness of pre-split must be "universal" then.

Whole cord and a half of "silver" Maple, quarter split or better, then tarped. Gone right off the carport.

And the "helpful soul" even took the tarps!

wheels17 · Dec 9, 2018

We pay astounding taxes in NY, but our town will pick up ANY wood and brush debris. Our neighbor took down a 4' at breast height oak, and left it at the curb. The town came in with a front loader and dump trucks and took it all away.

DDoug · Dec 9, 2018

9100 said:
We had to dispose of a dead tree so we cut it into manageable lengths and hauled it in a pickup to a composting operation. They charged $45 to take the wood and we unloaded ourselves. They will chip it up and leave it for nature to do its thing, then sell the mulch to people who pay to get it and haul it away.

Imagine how much money we could make if steel suppliers delivered steel and paid us to take it. We would turn it into chips which we would leave outside until they got good and rusty, then people would pay us for it and haul it away at no cost to us.

Bill

You've kind of glossed over the "Composting Operation"

I have a friend that owns one...he has:
1. 20 acres with runoff pond (and permits up the wazzoo)
2. A 2500 hp cat diesel running a hammermill along with
several conveyors, the curved screen is 3" thick plate.
3. A truck scale to weight a complete semi & trailer.
4. Several trucks, tri-axle dump trucks, semi trucks, etc.
5. A dying operation with related equipment and chemicals.
6. 4 large front end loaders.
7. A large repair garage.
8 At least 20 employees

The local township runs a similar but "composting" operating
(a make work using my tax money) it has:
1. 20 acres with run-off ponds
2. Large piles of inprocess materials
3. several large front loaders
4. a large tub grinder with conveyors
5. a "wildcat compost turner"
5. A truck scale
6. Office with break/bathrooms
7. Several (at least 10) employees

Try to calculate the hourly overhead rate for each operation....

Bobw · Dec 9, 2018

9100 said:
I cut it into firewood lengths and put at the front of my parking lot. It sat there for weeks without a taker.

The mistake there was NOT putting a price tag on it.. Put something out with
a "Free" sign on it and it will sit and rot. Put a price tag on the same thing
and somebody will come and "Steal" it thinking they are getting one over on you.

kustomizingkid · Dec 9, 2018

I cut up a BIG elm tree... had to borrow a 36" bar saw. Put it in front of my place and painted free on the biggest chunk. The small stuff was gone in two days and the big stuff sat and sat, and then one day a guy slammed on his brakes, unloaded his skid and damn near taco'ed his truck hauling it away.

I wasn't in a hurry and the universe solved my problem for me.

DDoug · Dec 9, 2018

kustomizingkid said:
I cut up a BIG elm tree... had to borrow a 36" bar saw. Put it in front of my place and painted free on the biggest chunk. The small stuff was gone in two days and the big stuff sat and sat, and then one day a guy slammed on his brakes, unloaded his skid and damn near taco'ed his truck hauling it away.

I wasn't in a hurry and the universe solved my problem for me.

I realize it's cold in Minnesota, but you couldn't get the stuff to light off ?

kustomizingkid · Dec 9, 2018

digger doug said:
I realize it's cold in Minnesota, but you couldn't get the stuff to light off ?

Oh I burned a lot of shit that weekend, but the trunk of that damn tree was 40"... can't wait to heat with wood again some day. I really enjoy splitting wood. Also the sun came out here today, almost forgot what that looked like.

9100 · Dec 9, 2018

Bobw said:
The mistake there was NOT putting a price tag on it.. Put something out with
a "Free" sign on it and it will sit and rot. Put a price tag on the same thing
and somebody will come and "Steal" it thinking they are getting one over on you.

Not around here. Good firewood goes the same day. People just didn't want to do the work of splitting the large oak logs. The wood we moved yesterday was not good firewood and it had fallen in a neighbor's yard. They were understanding about it but understanding only stretches so far. We needed to get it done.

Bill

Gordon B. Clarke · Dec 10, 2018

9100 said:
We had to dispose of a dead tree so we cut it into manageable lengths and hauled it in a pickup to a composting operation. They charged $45 to take the wood and we unloaded ourselves. They will chip it up and leave it for nature to do its thing, then sell the mulch to people who pay to get it and haul it away.

Bill

I don't think anyone else has asked so I will. Are those in the composting business getting rich? I use mulch in our garden now and then. Somebody has to make it for me to buy it.

Here it costs about $50 for a cubic meter.

Greenwud · Dec 10, 2018

Gordon B. Clarke said:
I don't think anyone else has asked so I will. Are those in the composting business getting rich? I use mulch in our garden now and then. Somebody has to make it for me to buy it.

Here it costs about $50 for a cubic meter.

No, I don't believe so. At one stage I looked at the economics of it and basically the transport and processing costs mean it has to be sold and the raw material has to be free or subsidised by a municipal authority. Trees and vegetation are mainly water, but wet wood is heavy and thus costly to transport.
The leachate from composting, while "natural" is bad news on an industrial scale and needs to be dealt with in much the same way as secondary stage processed sewage.

neilho · Dec 10, 2018

There's also the problem of contamination....

Golf courses, among others, spray herbicide for broadleaf weeds, mow the grass it's sprayed on, and send it off to be composted (in some cases.) Problem is, the herbicide can persist through the composting process and if someone puts the finished compost on their garden, most vegetable growth is stunted. DAMHIKT.

Large piles of compost are rendered useless, business rep suffers, and in this case, the operation closed for 6 months while it got sorted out. And that's just contamination by one compound. Sewage treatment plants have it even worse. Imagine dealing with all those prescription drugs, household cleaners and other nasty stuff that is flushed - a study of NY City's system claimed 2% of solids in the system were drugs and toxics.

We're prob the most chemicalized country on earth. Avoiding all that stuff it is a unique 1st world problem, but a problem.

DDoug · Dec 10, 2018

neilho said:
There's also the problem of contamination....

Golf courses, among others, spray herbicide for broadleaf weeds, mow the grass it's sprayed on, and send it off to be composted (in some cases.) Problem is, the herbicide can persist through the composting process and if someone puts the finished compost on their garden, most vegetable growth is stunted. DAMHIKT.

Large piles of compost are rendered useless, business rep suffers, and in this case, the operation closed for 6 months while it got sorted out. And that's just contamination by one compound. Sewage treatment plants have it even worse. Imagine dealing with all those prescription drugs, household cleaners and other nasty stuff that is flushed - a study of NY City's system claimed 2% of solids in the system were drugs and toxics.

We're prob the most chemicalized country on earth. Avoiding all that stuff it is a unique 1st world problem, but a problem.

Yup, the "Taxpayer funded compost operation"
Has large threatening signs "No grass clippings !"
And if your caught, they won't allow you back.

Seeing how my (and your federal taxes) are paying for this boondoggle,
and it's done under the eyes of "green".
Then maybe they should NOT cherry
pick the easy/profitable work, and figure out how to do it all.

OT Composting and why we are in the wrong business

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