While the composting center is a research facility, it also provides vital recycling services for BARC's 7,000-acre research farm, which includes greenhouses, animal barns, crop fields, pastures, and lawns and other landscaped areas. The compost facility recycles all this organic residue. This helps the farm comply with voluntary state restrictions designed to keep nitrogen and phosphorus out of the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries. The operational side of the compost facility is Randy Townsend's turf. Townsend is an ARS employee who is certified as a compost operator by the Maryland State Department of Agriculture.
Researchers require a steady and consistent supply for multiyear experiments.
Townsend has office space in a nearby trailer he shares with a mini-lab equipped with an oven for drying compost to measure its moisture content. To speed up composting, Townsend runs a windrow turner over the rows once a week. The turner has six rows of blades that rake through the piles, tossing and reforming them while letting air in. He will turn the piles more often if they're not getting enough air. He determines this with a 5-foot probe equipped with sensors for oxygen, temperature, and carbon dioxide.