Rocket Composter takes off in Australia

A community farm in Fish Creek, Victoria will divert 200–300 kg of food and green waste from landfill every day using the Rocket Composter from UK waste-to-energy solutions provider Tidy Planet.

Facilitated by Australian distributor Eco Guardians, the global partnership will see the A900 In-Vessel Composter (IVC) shipped over 17,000 km, where it will be installed on the Rail Trail near Buckley Park Community Farm.

Food and green wastes will be collected from surrounding residences before being fed into the Rocket — alongside a dry source of woodchip — to produce a nutrient-rich compost for use in the onsite gardens.

“This is a completely new project for the farm and, as we’re a community initiative, it was crucial that the environmental solution we invested in would allow for a completely closed-loop model,” farm volunteer Marg Watson said.

“We’ve been operating for over three years now, and our ethos has always been that a community should be able to grow enough food to feed all those who live in it. With the help of the Rocket, we’ll be able to produce high-quality compost for use on our cultivation plots.

“We’ve been strongly supported by the wider community in bringing this project to fruition, and we’re looking forward to what the future holds.”

As for green waste, soft environmental weeds from public and private land will be collected by local community groups and dried onsite, to be used as the main source of carbon content.

Tidy Planet Sales Manager Huw Crampton said, “This represents our first ever composting project in Australia and we’re really excited about taking our technology to the other side of the world.

“The food waste management debate has been hotting up in Oz for a while — ever since the government launched the National Food Waste Strategy in 2017 — and composting can provide an effective way to reduce landfill and carbon emissions at the same time.”