Composting on a large scale

[possum]

Has anyone done it?

Currently we have a few compost heaps and I collect the green waste from work every week.
Our soil is poor - extremely stoney as we are on what was a shingle beach that has gradually built up over 6000 years, so still really very young soil.
My plan is to increase the size of the veggie patch to about a half an acre, but it is having to be done with raised beds filled with compost, so we need a lot of compost.

We are opening up a campsite and will be attempting to get the campers to separate out their green waste and recyclables, so we are likely to be getting quite lot of waste on a regular basis.

There is a slight complication in that in summer we are in a severe fire risk area, temperatures in the mid 30s and very low rainfall. We have already once set the compost heap on fire by accidentally putting hot ashes on in (in winter) and almost had a severe fire on our hands (we have learnt from this). Apparently compost heap spontaneous combustion is a problem here as they can get so hot and dry that they do ignite.

So suggestions please, other that that it will have to be located away from our shelter belt and near a water supply.

[farmerdrea]

The Biological Husbandry Unit at Lincoln University does this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windrow_composting on a fairly good-sized scale. As I believe you have a tractor, you should be able to do it pretty easily. We do it in "miniature" in our vege path.

Cheers
Andrea
NZ

[possum]

thanks for that , I've not come accross that method before.
Yes we have a tractor, it is just a little one I guess from the 60s, but we could improvise an attachment of sorts if we put our minds to it I guess.