Restore ∙ Replenish ∙ Renew
In celebration of Earth Day, we’ve released our highly anticipated Spring Newsletter featuring National Bioenergy Day & clean energy in Vermont, cultivating success with manufactured topsoil, a recap of the Pig Roast and more! We hope you enjoy, and thanks for reading!
RMI Senior Project Manager Charley Hanson and Sales Representative Brandy Thomas, along with a very special four-legged guest, have been bringing story time to life at New Hampshire elementary schools. Students, faculty, and staff eagerly joined in to hear Charley regale the room with a reading of Mitchell Sharmat’s popular children’s book “Gregory, the Terrible Eater,” a tale of a young goat with some truly unusual eating habits. Following the story, Charley and Brandy herd lively little baby goat Buster into the classroom for a meet-and-greet with the audience. Students are encouraged to interact with Buster and to ask questions, especially about the eating habits of real goats.
Goat story time has been a great opportunity to foster a connection between students and animals they may be otherwise unfamiliar with, as well as to introduce them to some of the wonderful aspects of farm life. It’s also a fun way for us to give back to our community. Our thanks go out to the Sandwich Center School and the Jennie D Blake School for inviting Charley, Brandy, and Buster into the classroom!
House Bills 219 and 567 threaten wood ash production in New Hampshire!
If passed, these bills would be extremely detrimental to biomass plants and other sources of renewable energy including solar, wind, and hydro-electric plants by phasing out the New Hampshire Renewable Portfolio Standard law (RPS.) The RPS is a cornerstone of our state’s energy policy, and sunsetting this law would terminate predictable, reliable, and cost-effective power sources!
Biomass plants burn locally sourced wood to generate clean, domestic energy, providing essential jobs, revenue, and power to our rural communities. Biomass plants are an essential outlet for low-quality timber and play a critical role within the local forest products industry, and the wood ash they produce is an indispensable and sustainable fertilizer utilized by farmers throughout the Northeast!
Please contact the Science, Technology, and Energy Committee and urge them to oppose any efforts to revoke or weaken the RPS law, and to reject House Bills 219 and 567! https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1GiLHXWN_6Et-qgzR_tUxHytLsMtrrtXPfCayY3LUe6U/edit?gid=0#gid=0
On Saturday, September 21st, we celebrated our thirty-year anniversary with a revival of our beloved pig roast celebration where friends gathered alongside staff for a day full of hearty food and lively entertainment. The event was an opportunity for us to show our appreciation for the customers, partners, and the invaluable relationships that made our 30th anniversary possible.
RMI was founded in 1994 by President Shelagh Connelly, Vice President Marty Riehs, and Senior Project Manager Charley Hanson, and was created to provide innovative, sustainable recycling solutions to the generators of organic residuals. Today, we are the Northeast’s leader in the industry and recycle over 300,000 cubic yards of wood ash, paper fiber, and biosolids annually.
Shelagh remarked, “I feel fortunate to have stumbled into this recycling world in my first job out of college as a soil sampler. I got to visit farm fields all across New Hampshire and meet some of the hardest working farmers in places that are incredibly rural and beautiful. This led to many years of learning the science and policy behind recycling these fertilizer products, and now 36 years later to be running RMI and employing 25 people who are all passionate about their jobs and committed to being outstanding in our field!”
Many of the attendees at Saturday’s 30th anniversary pig roast were individuals that had been a part of our story since the very beginning. As Charley shared, “our first customer was Bridgewater Power Company just down the road, and we still work with this crew today. We are fortunate to partner with companies that are like-minded in their commitment to the environment and doing the right thing.”
Despite the changes and challenges over the years, we have never lost sight of our mission or core values, and continually strive to do right by those we serve. We attribute our success to strong relationships built within the local farming and land management communities, as well as a commitment to excellence that is shared by each and every employee.
Marty concluded, “I am quite proud that we have been successful for thirty years but none of those successes or years would have been possible without the trust of our customers or the guidance of our government regulators who have weathered many a storm from the sway of public opinion in which we operate, and they continue to hold us to such high standards. But the scope and breadth of our success would not be possible without the hard-working team of equipment operators, field staff, compliance and office personnel, and salespeople who have excelled at their jobs to keep RMI the success we are. Thank you all!”
RMI’s soil amendments are extremely versatile, and as such, we’ve supplied these recycled, sustainable materials for all kinds of unique projects throughout the Northeast. This year, we will be revisiting and sharing some of these engaging projects of the past as well as posting more of our current success stories!
Back in 2001, RMI was recommended to the city manager overseeing the closure of a landfill in Claremont, NH, who required approximately 25 acres worth of viable topsoil that could effectively cover and sustain hearty vegetative growth over the capped landfill. Topsoil used for a project of this caliber must be extremely erosion resistant to maintain the integrity of the site, especially if the land is sloped and/or located close to a body of water. We encountered some skepticism at first about our soil’s ability to meet the unique needs of the job. However, after learning that our Manufactured Topsoil would be erosion resistant enough on its own where an application of erosion control fabric would not be required, we were chosen for the job.
Staff at RMI managed the permitting and testing and created a material blend tailored to the exact nitrogen and long-term nutrient needs of the site. The closure required approximately 1350 cubic yards of topsoil per acre, placed to a depth of approximately nine inches over the geotextile mat. After planting a wildflower mix (our signature on jobs back in the day) a lively plant cover grew shortly after seeding, thriving with little additional input. Our manufactured topsoil excelled in this application and was estimated to have saved the city around $350,000.
June 1st marked the 113th Annual Meeting of the New Hampshire Timber Owners Association (NHTOA) held this year DeMeritt Hill Farm in Lee, NH. Attendees were treated to a verity of tours, including self-guided tours of the DeMerritt Hill Farm, Logging Camp, and forest management trails, as well as a silviculture tour led by members of the UNH Cooperative Extension at the nearby Lee Town Forest.
Following lunch, the 2024 NHTOA Awards Ceremony recognized several industrious members from many sectors of the timber industry, including tree farm managers, loggers, and forest products truckers. President Shelagh Connelly and Senior Project Manager Charley Hanson proudly accepted the Outstanding Forest Products Industry Award on behalf of RMI, which recognized the substantial quantities of residuals sourced from the timber industry that we recycle on an annual basis, as well as our contributions to the industry on a legislative level.
Last year, RMI recycled a total of 32,930 tons of wood ash and 32,661 tons of short paper fiber, 17,260 and 1,034 tons out of New Hampshire biomass and paper mills, respectively. Instead of going to landfill, RMI utilized these residuals as beneficial soil amendments and topsoil components, returning essential nutrients back into our native soils and restoring the productivity of the land.
Shelagh has advocated on a legislative level, collaborating with other organizations in the industry to create and support outreach efforts, educate the public on the many benefits of biomass and responsible forest management, and speak in support of at legislative events.
We are very thankful to the NHTOA for honoring us with this prestigious award and will continue to do our part to be good advocates for the timber industry. In addition, RMI donated a load of agricultural wood ash to the NHTOA Silent Auction which was won by one of our customers! If you haven’t already, make sure to check out the NHTOA’s website here: https://nhtoa.org/ where you can find information about upcoming events, education and workshop opportunities, legislative updates, and a directory for Certified Loggers and Licensed Foresters.
