‘State-Of-The-Art’ Composting Facility Approved For Quarry Site

The construction of an indoor composting facility has been approved for Falls Township.

The McGill Environmental Systems composting facility received unanimously preliminary and final land development approval from the Falls Township Board of Supervisors on Tuesday evening. 

The company plans to build a 127,000-square-foot facility on a 15.5-acre parcel located in the 600 block of Tyburn Road on a lot where the current property owner is involved with outdoor composting. 

Noel Lyons, co-founder of McGill Environmental Systems, came before the Supervisors and said the new facility will be “totally indoors.” He found the fact the site has an existing composting facility next door and the regional market is open for expansion very enticing. 

What was described as a “state-of-the-art” facility is expected to compost about 400 tons per day, Lyons said. 

Dave Allen, an engineer working on the project, said the majority of the larger 400-acre property where McGill Environmental Systems will lease their smaller patch of land and construct a building is an active sand and gravel quarry that is mainly covered with water.

The site is in the township’s farming and mining district.

Access to the new facility will be through an entrance at Tyburn Road and New Ford Mill Road and down a roughly half-mile service road, Allen said.

The company plans to create 15 to 20 jobs at the Falls Township site. The jobs would include those working on composting, administration, and sales.

As designed, the facility will take truckloads of compost after going through a weigh station. The material will next be blended and composted in bays within the building. Compost will then be screened for larger pieces, which will be placed back through the system, and smaller material will be cured and screened again before being shipped off as fill. The whole process takes about 30 days.

Lyons said there will be about 25 trucks per day at the facility.

Project attorney Tom Jennings said many of those trucks would normally be going to the landfill but will instead visit the composting company. 

McGill Environmental Systems seeks to compost yard waste, food waste, and wastewater residuals. Lyons said all the waste would be non-hazardous.

“Whatever comes in his front door leaves the back door as a product,” Jennings said.

Lyons emigrated from Ireland 29 years ago and co-founded McGill Environmental Systems.

“What started out as a very, very small company with very little capital is today, I’m proud to say, is one of the most respected businesses in the industry,” he said.

The company has its roots in systems developed at Rutgers University in New Jersey. 

McGill Environmental Systems operates facilities in Florida, North Carolina, and Ireland.

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