Rockville-Based Compost Crew Teams with Germantown’s Butler’s Orchard to Start Composting Project

Rockville’s Compost Crew Inc., the largest food scrap recycling company in the Mid-Atlantic, announced the opening of a new composting project at Butler’s Orchard in Germantown, Md. Under the terms of the partnership, Butler’s Orchard owns the composting program, which was constructed and will be operated by the experienced team from Compost Crew. “Compost is an important part of our healthy farming practices,” said Ben Butler, Farm and Finance Manager at Butler’s Orchard. “This partnership provides us with a guaranteed source of high-quality compost for our crops without the hassle, as Compost Crew does the dirty work.”

This location is the newest Compost Outpost®, a modular food scrap composting site that can be built in months. Compost Crew aims to promote distributed composting around the greater Washington, D.C. metropolitan area by creating a series of Compost Outposts in partnership with area farms, municipalities, and other property owners. The Compost Outpost at Butler’s Orchard started taking in food scraps earlier this month. It will process 20 tons of organic materials per month, including five tons of food scraps collected from approximately 200 Montgomery County homes. All finished compost produced at the Compost Outpost will be put to use on the farm, creating a circular system that minimizes the transportation of materials.

“This composting site at Butler’s Orchard is a real game changer,” said Montgomery County Council Vice President Evan Glass. “Montgomery County currently produces 147,000 tons of food waste per year and this partnership is a step toward fully harnessing the power of our land so that we reduce our waste and increase our climate goals. This is exactly the type of partnership I envisioned when I passed legislation allowing farms to increase compost and mulch capacity. I’m delighted that our efforts have taken root and are ready to flourish.”

In addition to this new Compost Outpost at Butler’s Orchard, Compost Crew also operates a Compost Outpost in partnership with One Acre Farm in Dickerson, Md. and has several other Outposts under construction. “We are delighted to add Butler’s Orchard to our expanding network of compost sites,” said Compost Crew CEO Ben Parry. “Processing these food scraps on the farm benefits the local environment by reducing driving time, and the finished compost provides a natural means of revitalizing the local soil.”