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Cacaloco composting operation heading to Rifle

John Stroud
Glenwood Springs correspondent
Aspen, CO Colorado

RIFLE, Colo. – A longtime local commercial compost operator, who was replaced at Glenwood Springs’ South Canyon Landfill last year when a new landfill manager was hired, has found a new home at Rifle’s Energy Innovation Center (EIC) site.

The city of Rifle and Garfield County have both approved an intergovernmental agreement allowing Jim Duke of Carbondale-based Cacaloco Enterprises Inc. to begin operating at the site later this summer. Duke is still awaiting final permitting from the state.

The composting facility will be located west of the existing solar farm, which is also situated on the EIC site on West Centennial Parkway (Highway 6) in Rifle. The site is also home to the city’s wastewater treatment plant, which will be instrumental in the composting operation.



Cacaloco will lease about 5 acres initially for the operation, with the option to expand to 10 acres in the future.

The facility will process biosolids from the wastewater treatment plant, as well as other organic wastes, septage and biosolids from around the region, for use in the composting process.




In addition, the facility will divert construction wood waste from Garfield County’s nearby Anvil Points Landfill, which will also be ground up and composted.

“The county supports the [EIC] concept and the compost facility and, to the extent wood products can be composted and not sent to the county landfill, the county saves space in the landfill and the public benefits,” according to language in the agreement approved by county commissioners last month.

The county is also a financial partner in the project, contributing $200,000 toward the construction of infrastructure on the EIC site.

In addition, the county will also purchase a shear grinder, at an estimated cost of between $300,000 and $500,000, for use at the landfill. It will be used to grind wood products that would otherwise end up in the landfill to be used as a bulking agent in the composting process, according to the agreement.

The landfill will also try to divert as much non-hazardous liquid septage from the landfill to the compost operation.

Up until early last year, Duke had been in charge of the composting operation at the South Canyon Landfill. However, the city of Glenwood Springs, owner of the landfill site, signed a contract with a new management company, Heartland Environmental Services, which took over the compost operation there.

Duke has since been composting livestock bedding in a small operation behind the LaFarge gravel pit near Carbondale.

He could not be reached to comment.

jstroud@postindependent.com