Tour 1:  Anaerobic Digester Tour (Whatcom County, Washington)

Head north toward the Canadian border for a tour of an integrated nutrient recovery system associated with an AD that receives multiple feedstocks for co-digestion. A second stop will highlight an AD that is scaled for smaller dairies.

This tour of two different anaerobic digesters will examine the benefits and challenges of operation of an AD system from the farmer perspective, the potential envrionmental benefits of digestion, the pros and cons of using co-products in digestion, the addition of new technologies for nutrient recovery, and how the end products of manure solids, liquid, and gas are being used.

For more information on Tour 1, please click on the following link:
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Tour 2:   Clean Samish Bay Initiative: Watershed Farm Tour (Skagit County, WA)

This tour will take you through the scenic Skagit Valley farmland with a presentation of the Samish Bay Watershed Initiative. The focus will be on the partnership that has developed amongst farmers and livestock farmers, Tribes, conservation districts, nonprofit organizations and state, federal and local agencies to minimize the impact of farming on coastal production of shellfish. Tour participants will have the oppotrunity to visit the Taylor Shellfish farm (the largest producer of Manila clams and Geoducks in the US) as well as visit small farms in the area that have adopted best management practices to reduce runoff.

This tour focuses on the immense water quality implementation efforts of the Samish Bay Watershed to reduce shellfish bed closures due to unsafe pollution levels by a number of local organizations including shellfish and livestock farmers, Tribes, conservation districts, nonprofit organizations and state, federal and local agencies. This joint effort has been working since 2010 to decrease the risk of nutrient and fecal coliform from farms and backyards in the watershed during periods of rain and high rainfall events.

For more information on the Clean Samish Initiative, please click on the following link:
The Clean Samish Initiative

For more information on Taylor Shellfish, please click on the following link:
Taylor Shellfish

For more information on Tour 2, please click on the following link:
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Tour 3:   Bainbridge Island: Equine and Small Farms Tour
IOS Ranch, HeyDay Farm, Islandwood Educational/Event Center (Bainbridge Island, Washington)

After taking the ferry from the Port of Seattle and heading west to Bainbridge Island, tour attendees will have the opportunity to visit three unique sites. IOS Ranch is a state of the art LEED certified sustainably designed equine faciility that has implemented water quality practices in addition to composting their waste and bedding using in-vessel composters. HeyDay farm is located on 25 acres of land that grows and sells organic food including effs, meat, dairy and produce. They process their waste from the animals, the entrails from the slaughtering of pigs and chickens, and the green waste from the produce in a concrete slab composting system. The last stop, Islandwood, is a sustainability driven educational program for children and adults situated on 255 acres of forest and tidelands. They have adopted an integrated system to manage their organic waste from the kitchen, the table, and the garden, and the compost that is created is recycled back into the gardens that produce the fruits and vegetables for the Islandwood kitchen.

For more information on Tour 3 please click on the following link:
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Tour 4: Composting Tour: Lenz Enterprises, Brightwater Treatment Facility, Cedar Grove Composting (King County, Washington)

This tour features a large scale state of the art composting facility, a new LEED certified county waste water treatment plant an done of the largest privately owned compost facilities in North America. Lenz Enterprises is a family owned earth materials and services business that produces compost using the Aerated Static Pile method and Trapezoidal Mass Bed composting technology; while reducing odors, VOC's and GHG's through in floor aeration, biofilters, computerized process control and reversible air technology. The new King County Brightwater Wastewater Treatment Plant sits on 114 acres with a LEED^(R)  Platinum education center, 708 acres of public open space, three miles of walking trails all while promising zero odor detection outside the boundaries of the site through an extensive odor control system. As part of the treatment process, one hundred percent of the organic solid material is converted into soil amendments onsite and distributed around the state of Washington. A second stop on the tour will be at the Cedar Grove Composting Everett Facility. They process feedstocks such as yard debris and food scraps from commercial and residential sources in the Seattle Metro area. The  operation has a permitted capacity of 228,000 tons and over 150,000 cubic yards of annual sales to urban landscaping and local agriculture.

For more information on Tour 4, please click on the following link:
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