SRM Development LLC, of Spokane, has launched a new subsidiary called PacifiClean Environmental that will seek to work with government entities and large private-sector clients to develop multimillion-dollar, organic-processing facilities.

The division is headed by Larry Condon, who a couple of months ago resigned as general manager of Barr-Tech LLC's organic-processing facility 22 miles southwest of Spokane to pursue other business opportunities.

"There is a lot of potential in this field," Condon says.

PacifiClean Environmental, though founded just two months ago, already has seven potential projects on which it's negotiating, he says. That includes one near the Spokane Regional Solid Waste System waste-to-energy plant on the West Plains, one in Kittitas County in Central Washington, one in Tillamook County in Oregon, and four in California, he says.

PacifiClean's objective is to reduce clients' waste handling and disposal costs by helping them develop integrated organic-processing facilities that produce zero waste. The plants, using a symbiotic, part aerobic-part anaerobic system design, would be set up to turn processing byproducts into a revenue stream, including from generated renewable energy, high-grade compost, and fruits and vegetables grown at onsite greenhouses.

Condon says PacifiClean's goal is to replicate an organic-processing model that uses existing technologies, can be scaled to the size needed by the client, and would be flexible enough to allow for future facility expansion.

Due to the volume and types of organic materials the model is designed to accommodate, though, the cost of developing the processing facilities probably would run mostly from around $6 million to $18 million, he says.

An organic-processing facility near the waste-to-energy plant here could create "a perfect trifecta of waste management," he asserts, matched with the trash-burning incinerator itself, which takes waste that isn't recyclable, and a nearby $12 million recycling center that Waste Management of Spokane plans to develop.

Condon, focused on business development, currently is PacifiClean's only dedicated employee and is working out of space in SRM's offices at 111 N. Post downtown, but he says he has broad support from the rest of the development company's veteran team there.

"You've got to have a team that's not risk averse" to take on a venture like this, he adds.

SRM is a private, investor-funded real estate acquisition, development, construction, and asset-management company. It was founded by John Stone, Jim Rivard, Dee McGonigle, and Bryan Stone, but John Stone has since transferred his interests in the company to his former partners.

In recent years, SRM has focused its efforts in what it calls high barrier, urban core, and high population-growth markets, with an emphasis on mixed-use developments with apartments, senior housing, condominiums, and retail and office space. Its website says it has completed projects valued at more than $500 million since 2002.

Spokane-based Barr-Tech, Condon's former employer, has been developing a planned $14 million organic-processing facility in rural Lincoln County that, once completed, would be similar in operation to the types of facilities Condon now is pursuing through SRM.

Barr-Tech's intent is to draw yard, food, paper, wood, and other organic waste—such as grease, fats, oils, and biosolids—to the facility from private-sector and government generators and to use those feedstocks to create high-grade compost, renewable energy, and compost.

The company hopes to attract waste from a sizable Eastern Washington area, but it has touted in particular its proximity to the Spokane metropolitan area and how that translates into transportation-related cost savings for big waste generators.

Condon's brother, Ted Condon, and Jack Gillingham own the Barr-Tech facility, which presumably would face competition from the facility proposed near the waste-to-energy plant if that facility were to be developed.