"Earth knows no desolation. She smells regeneration in the moist breath of decay."

- George Meredith

In 1994, former agroecology professor Tom DeLuca submitted a grant proposal to the Department of Environmental Protection to create a municipal composting facility on the abandoned three acre hillside adjacent to the Macoskey Center.Together the Macoskey Center, the borough of Slippery Rock and University Food Services have built one of the most comprehensive composting projects in the state. The compost is a combination of pre-consumer food scraps from the dining halls and yard wastes collected from borough residents.

The first year was filled with legal meetings, paperwork, and negotiations including purchases of an 85 horse power tractor needed to pull the compost turner, already in place from a previous grant. With the help of 2 MS3 graduate students, Kody Cario and Gary Goodson, and administrative work by Mary Ann King, the Center kick started the project with fall leaf pick-ups and food waste drop-offs.

The windrows had subsurface drainage leading into a clay-lined catchment pond to retain nutrients in the system. By 1998 the Center was collecting nearly 100 cubic yards of fall leaves and processing an average of 700 pounds of food waste each week. This site was further enhanced by creation of the adjacent land into an ecological restoration site. - Source: Marianne Sarrantonio, Alternator Article, Summer 1999.

Turning the compost windrows

The final  compost product, "black gold".