Composting is Nature's Way of Recycling

Composting is a very important part of organic gardening and boidynamic gardening. It adds organic matter to the soil for earthworms and other living organisms to survive along with adding fertility to the soil.Having a soil with good structure and thriving with earthworms and other living organisms will greatly benefit your garden. A good healthy soil with organic matter not only adds the nutrients needed for plants to survive, it also defends against plant disease and unwanted insects.

Composting is an excellent way to add nutrients back into the soil to feed plant life and benefit the environment. It improves the soil structure, helps control moisture and can help protect plants from certain diseases.It also makes the soil more fertile and helps plants develop a healthier root system.

Composting is the decaying process by millions of organisms that feed off organic material such as household and yard waste by turning it into excellent organic fertilizer and organic amendments for your garden soil. It is the duplication of natures natural system that breaks down organic materials on the ground in the forest and fields. Plants grow, die off and fall to the ground and decay. This process is natures way of adding nutrition back into the soil to feed new plants and is an environmentally friendly way to reduce household trash and to turn it into a nutritious additive for your garden soil. More than half of your household waste can be composted.

There are different systems and methods that can be used to make compost. Composting systems vary in size You can build home made bins or buy a commercially made composting system depending on how much room you have and how much composting you plan on doing or you can trench compost. There is also the basic way of just making a pile and letting it decompose naturally. Whichever way you choose you will end up with the same ending product A nutrient rich humus material called compost. Full of nutrients that will benefit your garden.

Composting is an excellent way to recycle the organic waste from your household and yard.

John_Yazo

3 Things Everyone Should Know About Composting

Composting is not very difficult but it does require a little bit of effort. A successful composting program takes a little bit of your time. But the end result is well worth it, especially if your next project is going to be organic gardening.

The two actually go together. You will be able to utilize the full potential of your compost on your organic garden. Compost is really an organic fertilizer that the garden plants will love. The main reason for gardening may be for beautification purposes. But when you go the organic route, the reason will be much more in tune with nature. By making a compost garden, you are also being one with nature. You are doing your part in preserving its beauty by gathering the waste elements that can be recycled to act as fertilizers to your garden.

You do not want to get into trouble with your neighbors for the sake of nature so keep the un-attractive odors down. To achieve this you should keep the pile oxygenated. You can turn the materials periodically to gain such an effect. This will help the materials in your compost heap to break down faster.

The hot method is much faster than the cold method, but the hot method does require a little more effort on your part. The hot method requires about a 50/50 mix of brown and green composting material. This ratio does vary depending on different sources, but the amount does not have to be exact. Think of a composting lasagna. You must remember to moisten the pile periodically for the bacteria to grow so they can aid in decomposing the materials faster.

Watch out for unwanted visitors, You must be vigilant in a sense that if you are seeing flies and other pests inhabiting your pile. One solution is to add strips of paper to the top of your bin, if they can't land they will not be able to lay their eggs.

S W Allen

All About Garden Composting

Why should I compost?

• Organic matter improves soil structure and gives life. It opens up heavy soils, aids drainage and provides good growing conditions. Light or sandy soils benefit from its moisture retentive properties.
• It provides nutrients for plants. The nutrients in your compost depend on what has been put in your bin, but will always contain a wide range of trace elements and plant foods.
• It is a completely natural product. In nature, all living things eventually decay; composting simply speeds up the process.
• It is free and environmentally friendly. Up to 30% of household waste is organic and can be converted into compost for use in the garden. Composting is good for plants, good for the environment and good for us.

Where should I locate my Composter?

• Preferably in a warm or sheltered position, but this is not essential.
• place on bare soil. This will aid drainage and allow worms and bacteria to enter and aid breakdown of the raw material.

What can I put in it?

• Garden Waste: All types of garden waste including annual weeds, grass cuttings, fallen fruit and old vegetable plants, bedding plants, chopped prunings, hedge clippings, horse and poultry manure and urine, straw, feathers, dried fallen leaves, sawdust and wood shavings, shredded wood and twigs, seaweed, spent compost.
• Household Waste: Teabags/leaves, egg shells, coffee grounds, fruit and vegetable waste, human and animal hair, feathers, shredded and soaked cardboard, paper, wood ash.
• Avoid: Cooked food and meat (attracts rodents).

How to Make the Best Compost?

The composting process requires raw material, water and air. Good compost comprises a balance of as many ingredients as possible. Too much grass will create a slimy mess; too much woody material will create a dry heap, which decomposes very slowly. Chopping and cutting ingredients into small pieces before adding to the composter will facilitate faster decomposition.

The most important balance to achieve is the proportion of woody, high carbon material (e.g. dried leaves, straw, paper, twigs, hedge clippings) to sappy, high nitrogen material (e.g. plants, weeds, vegetables & fruit, grass, manure). The woody material keeps the compost open and aerated, preventing the soggy mass that results from composting too much nitrogen-rich material (such as grass cuttings). However, it provides little or no nutrients for the bacteria in the heap, which creates the heat required for good composition. Soft material contains the nitrogen needed by bacteria, plus water. During colder months a piece of polystyrene or old carpet placed in the bin on top of the compost will prevent heat loss.

An essential ingredient for composting is air. The best way to introduce air into the composter is to fork up the contents and turn it over. It is a good idea to do this on a regular (monthly) basis.

When will the compost be ready to use?

Shredded material that has been kept moist and turned several times can be ready for use in the garden in just a few months but six months is more typical. The length of time really depends on the mixture of ingredients, air temperature, size of coarser material and how quickly the composter unit was filled. Compost at the bottom will always be ready first, so always remove from the bottom first.

If a finer texture is preferred, sieve out the coarse material; this can be used as mulch around the garden or in the base of planters/garden pots to provide drainage and nutrients, or simply replace in the bin for further breakdown. Do not use garden compost for delicate seedlings because it is not sterile.

Happy Gardening.

Owen_Chubb

The author is principal of OWEN CHUBB GARDEN LANDSCAPES LIMITED, an established and award winning garden landscaping company based in Dublin, Ireland. The company offers clients a complete landscaping service including Garden Design, Construction & Planting.

Worm Composting - Making the Bedding

Using composting worms is a great way to increase the turn-around time of your compost. The worms eat the compost that you add to the pile and then produce nutrient-rich castings for your garden. The worms live in an area of the composting pile called "bedding", which should make up the majority of the compost pile by volume. You will have to create the bedding for your worms, but do not worry, it is easy to do. Here is a list of things that make great bedding:

• Shredded newspaper or cardboard
• Saw dust
• Shredded, fallen autumn leaves
• Dead plants
• Mature compost
• Aged manure

Using just one of those ingredients to make your bedding is not the best idea. Ideally, you would have a bit of everything. The finished bedding should take up about three quarters of your compost bin; that is right, 75%. It may seem like a lot, but the worms need a place to live.

The bedding must be moist (like a wrung-out sponge) and you will want to cover your compost bin to reduce evaporation. Make sure the bedding is loose with lots of pockets of air because the worms need air to survive.

Now that your bedding is finished you can add the worms. For every pound of compost you plan on adding per day you will need two pounds of worms (roughly 2000 worms). You should be able to buy them at your local garden store or from a farmer. You may even have a friend who can give you some worms to get you started. Once they are settled into your compost bin they multiply rapidly, but you will want to stick to the 1 pound of compost to 2 pounds of worms rule. That means, if you do not have two pounds worms you have to reduce the amount of compost you add every day. It is tricky measure how many worms you have, you will have to go buy how much compost they can consume. If you find that your worms cannot keep up to the amount of compost you are adding you will have to reduce your daily compost addition until you have enough worms. You will get a feel for it after a while.

Henry Allpas

Improve Organic Gardening Using Composting

Building up sustainable soil for organic gardening starts right after the garden soil testing has been completed. The testing of the soil helps to identify the additional fertilizers and conditioners that can be added. When attempting to garden organically, testing, maintaining and improving the soil is a constant process and one that is well worth the effort, according to those who advocate organic farming and gardening.

Creating sustainable soil for gardening organically means that you have to be able to replenish the topsoil of the garden. One of the best substances to have for keeping the soil rich and healthy enough for an organic garden is a good supply of compost. In addition to compost, it is good to have enzymes, earthworms, and beneficial microbes available to add into the soil mixture as well.

In most cases, when the garden bed has been established with great quality soil that is able to support and sustain organic gardening, it can then be maintained by simply adding home composting on a routine basis. This can easily be done by replacing a layer of the garden soil with a layer from your compost.

Backyard composting is a terrific way to improve your soil structure and also enhance moisture retention. In the average compost heap there are billions of bacterial organisms that will grow, feed, reproduce and die. Through this life-cycle of the microorganisms, the organic waste material that has been added to the compost pile will be recycled into a robust organic fertilizer and effective soil conditioner.

Many people say that composting is truly the ultimate in recycling because it benefits the soil in so many ways and supports organic farming and gardening in its highest and best sense. In addition to improving the structure of the soil and the moisture retention ability of the soil, composting also provides excellent aeration, full fertilization and nitrogen storage. Composting also creates a beneficial pH balance in the soil, releases a stream of nutrients and supplies food for the beneficial microbial inhabitants in the earth.

Shredded alfalfa hay is one of the best types of material that you can add to your compost heap, and some say it is "the" secret to a great compost recipe. Worms really thrive on alfalfa, making worm composting even more effective and faster, and it provides excellent mulch and soil additive components for your soil.

When you want to get your compost ready for your organic gardening undertaking, you should make the compost pile about four feet high and also about four feet wide as well. It needs to be located in an area that allows for good drainage and it should be surrounded with chicken wire so it will have proper air circulation. After about three to four months, your compost will be ready to mix in with the soil and begin working wonders for your garden.

Mike_Selvon

Adventures in Home Composting

Kitchen leavings such as banana peels, cantaloupe rinds and eggshells do not need to go into the trashcan. They can be recycled in compost bins to provide wonderful nutrients for succeeding generations of vegetation. With more people becoming devoted to the environment, composting is a simple procedure that can be implemented at home to reduce the negative impact on the eco-system. Composting is easy to start at home; simply keeping a small garbage pail dedicated to eco-friendly refuse in the kitchen can help you begin. At the end of each day, simply take the materials out to the area where you keep your compost bin. With very little effort and some assistance from the natural activities of bugs and warmth from the sun, you can cultivate nutrient rich soil for your garden, house plants or landscaping and feel good about being pro-active and reducing waste in landfills.

For those who do not wish to purchase a ready-made compost bin, it's uncomplicated to make one from lumber. Anyone with little knowledge can build a compost bin in a brief period of time. There are many instructions available online, so you have the chance of picking a plan that appeals to your aesthetic taste. You will need materials and, if raccoons or other wild animals are troublesome in your area, you may want a hinged cover to keep animals out.

Compost bins are generally affordable and simple to construct. One of the easiest ways involves taking sections of snow fence and making them into a square by attaching all corners to a strong post, and then staking it into the ground. Others have fashioned compost bins from used skids or simply by creating a circle from chicken wire. If you want a stronger compost bin, consider using two by fours to craft a square compost bin with gaps for airflow.

Put the compost bin at a sufficient distance from your home so that you can't smell any waste, yet close enough for convenience. You should also keep in mind that the compost bin will naturally be warm because of the biological process occurring inside of it. In order to keep this heat, if you live in a colder climate you will need to place it in a sunny area. If you dwell in a very hot, dry climate, you will need to add water to it occasionally and perhaps put it in a sheltered area. It needs to sustain some warmth and moisture, but any severity in temperature will likely slow down the progression.

When your compost pile is in full swing, it will be easy to maintain and reap the many benefits from your good intentions. Continuously add scraps from the kitchen like onion peels, lettuce, even whole fruits or vegetables that went bad before you had the opportunity to eat them. It is essential to turn the soil at least once per season to keep the soil oxygenated. The material at the bottom should be exposed to the top and vice versa for the bottom. Such simplicity with great rewards should provide encouragement to keep up with other environmentally friendly habits. Don't forget that children love the idea too.

Anita_Koppens

Composting Kitchen Waste - Saving Landfills and Your Garden

Did you know that the average household produces nearly 200 pounds of kitchen waste every year? According to the King County Solid Waste Division in Washington, more than 35 percent of waste collected from the county's single family residences is composed of food scraps and soiled paper. That amounts to over 250,000 tons of food waste and soiled paper per year in only one county. All of that could be recycled into compost.

If you currently have a compost bin or pile on your property consider saving food scraps from your kitchen, if you don't already. You can take the material to your main bin daily or even weekly. If you plan to wait more than a day, though, I would suggest you consider purchasing a compost keeper for your kitchen. Compost keepers typically are sealed containers for storing food waste. Some models are even equipped with replaceable carbon filters that are useful for eliminating odors between trips to your compost pile.

For those more adventurous souls, vermiculture, or worm composting is another option. Worm composting can be done inside your own home. Gardeners who choose this method often have a bin directly under their sinks. This bin, filled with living earthworms, is the new waste bin for food scraps instead of the trash can. The worms quietly go about turning your waste into "castings" that make up an extremely fertile material that also conditions your soil.

Composting in the kitchen can add beneficial nutrients and amendments to your garden soil while saving landfill space at the same time. Have you begun to take part in this recycling effort? I have.

Thomas Smith.

Home Composting: 10 Ways to Make It Successful for You

Gardening is a fun and invigorating activity. It keeps one busy and productive and brings the creativity and ingenuity in everyone. Gardening beautifies our homes but it also produces a good deal of yard waste. What better way to make this waste wok out for you than to use it to enrich your garden through composting? You’d be making your soil more fertile for the health of your plants and at the same time, you’d be helping you community dispose of waste in the cleanest, cheapest and easiest manner. Here are some simple ways to make home composting successful for you:

1. Select the best compost material. Composting is simply simulating, if not imitatinag nature’s natural process of breaking down dead matter and using it to replenish the soil’s nutrients. The best source would obviously be your own yard waste such as the dried leaves, straw and wood chips from your own vegetation. Experts recommend using “browns” and “greens”. Browns are rich in carbon while greens are rich in nitrogen.
2. Correct combination of compost materials. To make home composting successful, it is better to combine different compost materials that to use just one type. Combine some of the materials mentioned in the above tip and shred them into small pieces to make them easier to store in case you might want to pile them later.
3. Use of manure can also mean successful home composting. Manure is also a rich source of organic materials and may come from a variety of animals such as chicken, ducks, pigs, sheep, cow and goats. They are rich sources of nitrogen which plants need in building up their tissues. It is best to layer this manure with dried leaves and to not simply add it into the pile s that it is effectively decomposed and incorporated into the compost.
4. Cold composting. Cold composting is easy enough to do which involves piling all the materials you have chosen as compost materials. Put them up in a pile and give them time to decompose, after months or a year, you’d have a rich compost from the decomposition of these materials.
5. Hot composting is more systematic and laborious than cold composting but it works. The pile should be at least 3- feet deep and is made up of alternating materials. Water is sprinkled regularly on the pile keep it most for microbial growth and action. Once in a while, you may mix the pile to expose the lower layers to oxygen and promote further decomposition of organic matter. This should generate some heat in the compost as gases are produced with the breakdown of organic matter.
6. Stink management is also a key to successful home composting. If the pile is not aerated enough, it begins to give off a bad odor. To resolve this problem, turn and mix the pile once in a while. Do not allow your compost pile to simply stink up.
7. Keep moisture level up but not too much. Adding too much water will waterlog your microorganisms which will not be good for them too and will inhibit their decomposing activities.
8. If the pile is dry and is not heating up, one has to do the entire pile all over again and this time cut the materials into smaller pieces. Add enough water also to make the entire pile moist to stimulate microbial activity.
9. No matter how you are promoting the decomposition of organic waste, you compost should not be a breeding ground for flies and ants that can be sources of diseases and may hard your plants in the long run. Another key to successful home composting is management of these insects by covering the pile with dirt. It does not do if these insects would proliferate in your compost because they may do more harm than your compost may do you good.
10. For a successful home composting, keep your compost pile within your yard. It should be contained within a particular space so it does not look like a dumpsite of some sort. Building a simple fence may do the trick. Your enclosure should also allow some air to get in through the sides.

Lee Dobbins

Why Composting is Useful For the Environment

Composting is akin to recycling but in the broader sense, recycling includes everything. Whether it is composting or recycling the objective is to provide a conducive environment for our future generations. Earth is getting depleted and if we don't do our part to preserve virtually the only habitable place that we know of, then will it rankle us if all we left behind is one lump of uninhabitable planet.

Recycling is more visible nowadays as we can see separate garbage bins for cans as well as clothes and pots or vases. It is noticeable in our everyday life but composting is slightly different as it comprises the recycling of materials that are found in nature. Think of dried leaves, grass clippings, fruit peelings, vegetable, animal manure, sawdust, etc.

Composting is basically for the purpose of gardening and in essence organic gardening. Throw out all synthetic products such as pesticides as we only require organic materials. Compost is not only environmentally friendly; it makes the soil healthier and in turn gives rise to better crop that if free from chemicals.

Organic gardening requires lots of hard work but if you put your soul and heart into it, the effort is worth all the sweats. Even if you can't afford the needed time, you still give compost a shot irrespective of whether you are living in urban or rural areas. It is not necessary to create the compost yourself if you have a garden in an urban home as long as you keep to the rules in organic farming. That is no chemicals or pesticides so away with materials that are not naturally produced.

It is the trend to purchase everything organic although it is not completely proven that organic produces are healthier than other farming methods when it comes to the matter of health. It is so fashionable that there is not just organic food but organic soap, tissue, cloth and just about everything as everyone chips in to care for our delicate environment.

In the course of composting we have nature in our heart besides contributing to the causes of our mother earth. Composting takes some time to get a hang of and some may be hesitant whether it is making or using compost. It is an arduous task to make compost as it can be smelly as well as our view that compost piles and garbage in our backyard is filthy.

If making it is complicated, then you can consider purchasing the fertilizers and the compost essentials from your neighborhood garden stores. That should be easier if that will lead you to make use of composting to help our environment.

Jason Jhyiong

Composting Toilets - Home Water Conservation

Composting toilets are one way you can conserve more water at home (composting toilet systems have also been developed and successfully implemented in high traffic areas like schools and offices). There is lots of opportunity for you to conserve water in your home. Some of the options are more involved than others, but they are a small price to pay for the environment.

First, let me clarify the problem. We have clean, treated water pumped into our homes for our use. In some places, residents have to pay for the water (either by volume or a flat monthly fee) and in some places the water is still free. We use the clean, treated water in our showers and baths to clean ourselves, in our toilets to remove our waste, in our washing machines to clean our clothes, in our kitchen to clean our hands, our dishes and our food, and in the garden to water our plants and lawns. There are countless other ways we use clean water at home, but I want to keep this article manageable. The formerly clean water is then pumped to sewage treatment plants where we try to clean the water again.

The major waste is most often the shower. Hands up everyone who has stood in the cozy hot shower and just let the water run all over you just because it felt good. Pretty much everyone has at one point or another and it is a BIG waste. When you design your home and you can actually have the shower run-off (which is often called grey water because it is no longer clean) be used in your irrigation system. The water used in your sinks can be reused the same way. The water is run through a filter to remove chemicals like soap and hair conditioner before it is used for the irrigation. You may also want to install low flow fixtures in your showers and aerators in your faucets to further decrease water use.

Flush toilets are another major waster. A regular toilet uses about 4 to 6 gallons of clean water for one flush (which adds up to about 100,000 gallons of water being flushed by the average North American family every year). You can install low flow toilets to reduce the amount of water used and if you use composting toilets in your home you will be using zero gallons of water per year to flush. You can find composting toilets on the main stream market in North America, although most people do not know about them. They are very clean and hygienic when used properly and provide you with nutrient rich humus that you can add to your garden to make it healthier.

You can also do some work on the irrigation system itself. Drip irrigation systems are much more efficient that the traditional spray systems. With the drip system there is an outlet at the roots of every plant. The water slowly drips out and goes directly to the plant rather than being in accurately sprayed by spray irrigation.

Henry_Allpas

How to Make a Compost Pile & What to Compost

It's pretty basic really, make a pile of mixed up organic (in the it was once alive sense of the word) items. You can use a commercial compost bin or compost tumbler, a homemade compost box of old wood scraps or chicken-wire, or even just make a big pile of compost in a corner of the yard. The important bit is what goes into your compost pile not how expensive it was to construct.

What Can I Compost?

Nature is already showing us what we can compost. In its most basic sense anything that was once alive will break down into organic components. So if an item is comprised of 100% natural materials it can be composted. So your goal when composting should be if something was once alive it can be added to my compost pile to prevent its goodness being wasted. Anything once alive will add goodness to your garden when it has been composted.

Now we all have preconceived notions of what can be added to the compost pile and need to work with these. If there is something on the list you do not already compost try adding it. You'll reduce your household waste and increase your compost heap.

• Compost your garden prunings, lawn clippings and weeds. Just make sure the prunings are shredded or broken up into small pieces and lawn clippings are mixed throughout the compost heap. Prolific weeds may be soaked in a bucket of water for a few weeks so they turn into mush which definitely won't survive the heat of your compost pile. Seriously diseased plants such as brassicas infected with clubroot may be burnt first and the ashes added to the plot to prevent the clubroot disease reinfecting your soil later on.
• Compost your vegetable peelings. All your vegetable waste from the kitchen can go straight onto your compost pile.
• Compost your paper and cardboard. All your uncoated paper and card should be shredded / ripped up and added to the compost heap. Don't forget to remove plastic windows from envelopes and plastic tape from cardboard packaging. Laminated papers and cards cannot be added as they'll leave a plastic film which won't break down so keep an eye on what kind of paper and card products you purchase.
• Compost your kitchen scraps even meat and fish. Meat and fish was once alive so will compost down into lovely goodness for your soil too. Just ensure your compost pile is pet proof and put these items deep into the pile, not just left on top for the local wildlife to feast on! Raw or cooked kitchen scraps will break down but if there is any issue with dogs trying to break into your heap cooked bones may be a problem as they are brittle and could be dangerous if swallowed.
• Compost dog waste. Again make sure the composting dog poop is always buried within the compost heap and it will break down fine. Poo (manure) is full of bacteria who love to break down organic items. Introducing manure to your compost pile will bring in these useful bacteria to help speed up the composting process.
• Compost manure. If you have other livestock or access to farmyard manure the addition of small quantities throughout the compost heap will heat things up and speed things along. Commercial organic compost activators are often primarily dried manure.
• Compost urine. This is probably best left to the boys. Urine is full of nutrients which will help activate your compost pile. Asking a gentleman to occasionally wee on the compost pile will do nothing but good.
• Compost human manure. It's no different to any other manure and can be composted very successfully. So if you have space for a dry composting toilet you can reduce your water usage and improve your compost creation in one step.
• Compost wood ash and sawdust. Wood ash from a wood burning fire is excellent added to the heap providing potash and other nutrients. Sawdust added in small quantities through the pile will improve bulk but may slow down the composting action if added too liberally.
• Compost pet or livestock bedding. Whether it be bedding from a gerbil cage or the contents of a hen coop, these natural materials (straw / hay / sawdust etc) will be covered in animal manure and urine and therefore fantastic additions to the compost heap. N.B. most commercial cat litters are not natural and thus not suitable for the compost heap - make sure you read the packet to see if the product is natural and was 'once alive'.
• Other natural fibers. So old woolen sweaters, cotton socks, hair (if you cut your own) or pet fur (if you trim theirs) will break down too. Don't forget to check for synthetic additions to clothing including buttons, zippers or just man-made fibers such as lycra.

Remember! Anything which was once alive, will break down into compost.

How to Compost

Unless you're using a commercial container for composting, a rough guide is to aim for a finished heap at around 1m (or 1 yard) cubed. Once you reach your finished size cover your pile with carpet or plastic sheeting to keep the worst of the weather off and leave your heap to do its stuff for six months to a year.

If you're using any kind of manure leave the heap for at least a year before putting it onto your soil. If the heap is working well all pathogens contained in the manure will have been long gone in around three months but its easier to wait longer and not have to worry!

Ensure your compost heap is pet-proof.

Make sure the heap is built with a mixture of items so it remains aerated throughout due to the different sizes and types of particles within it. If you're likely to have a surplus of one item such as grass clippings make a separate pile of this which you can then add at intervals onto the heap. Try to aim for a layered approach to the compost heap such as some kitchen scraps followed by lawn clippings, paper, dog waste, ash etc.

If you live in a dry climate add water / urine / washing up water to the heap. The compost heap is full of living organisms so it needs to be moist. Likewise if you live in a wet climate cover the heap to prevent all those living organisms drowning.

Be sensible. You're adding things that are starting to break down - food scraps, animal waste, so observe basic hygiene at all times - keep the kids occupied somewhere else and wash your hands!

It is good practice to cover anything animals might find interesting within the heap. So either dig a small hole whenever adding kitchen waste etc or keep a batch of weeds / law clippings / straw etc to cover the interesting stuff whenever you add it. This will deter animal and insect pests. If you leave a piece of leftover roast chicken breast on the top of your compost heap you would expect a few birds, flies, cats and dogs to take an interest so cover up the interesting stuff! This will also keep the smells in.

Your finished compost will smell like rich woodland soil, crumbly and dark. But obviously if you're adding poo to your pile you don't want the smell of poo around before the composting action gets going. So cover up or bury within the heap, all the smelly stuff!

Once you add your own made compost to your garden you'll never want to buy another bag of the shop bought stuff again and you'll love have less household waste to dispose of elsewhere. So go on get composting. It is the most basic method of reducing waste and recycling. Mother Nature's always done it and now, so should we.

Lec_Watkins

Human Waste As an Alternative Energy Source

With all of the news buzz these days around renewable energies such as solar and wind power, even harnessing the energy of ocean waves, one often neglected energy source is right under our noses, so to speak: human waste. It may not be as appealing or pleasant as the alternatives, but energy generation from human waste could be the most important of all. World population increases every day along with demand for energy and resources, and resources become scarcer and more coveted. The only potential resource that will increase proportionate to population is our own waste. Feces and urine are abundant and readily available wherever there are humans. Currently vast quantities of energy made from fossil fuel combustion and (often potable) water are used to process said waste products. New projects in composting toilets, biogas harvesting, biofuels creation and even microbial fuel cells could allow us to reverse the cycle and take advantage of this untapped resource.

Though skeptics believe that composting toilets will never be successful in the Western world, new technologies as well as old are being used to solve two problems: how to treat our waste, and how to produce enough food without poisoning ourselves and our environment with expensive chemical fertilizers. The next generation of composting toilets, such as that made by Clivus Multrum, are solving these problems and making the system more appealing to consumers. The low-flow composting toilets that they produce contain a basement level compost bin and service is included with the product. A much more low-tech version of the composting toilet is being used by the NGO Estamos in Africa. Although the organization's aims are to improve sanitation and reduce illness, their programs are also helping small-scale farmers make a living. The organization provides composting toilets at no charge, and has greatly improved the quality of life for many poor families. The organization's director, Feliciano dos Santos, just won the 2008 Goldman Environmental Prize in Ecological Sanitation for this work.

Many countries have well-established methane-capture programs that use animal waste, such as pig farms in Australia and cattle ranches in the United States. But what of the gas creation potential of human waste? Developing countries are pioneering this technology as a way to save money and create renewable energy. With the help of the Heifer International Foundation, rural farmers in Uganda's Mukono district are mixing human feces and urine with other biological waste such as water hyacinth and banana peels to create biogas, and using the byproduct to fertilize their fields. The biogas produced contains 60-90% methane, and is being used for lighting, cooking and some engines, and many residents are improving their quality of life and rising above the poverty level. Likewise, Cyangugu prison in Rwanda is creating biogas from the excrement of its prisoners. The Kigali Institute of Science and Technology built the digester for the prison, which is using the resulting product to cook 50% of the prisoner's meals, and saving $22,000 annually -- a great deal of money in Rwanda. But developing countries aren't the only ones taking advantage of human generated biogas. The Lions Gate Wastewater Treatment Plant in Vancouver, British Columbia, once the subject of a lawsuit regarding a violation of federal pollution laws, has piloted a $1.1 million project to harvest methane from the city's sewage and feed it directly into the natural gas distribution system. The project, which is expected to be operational in 2009, projects a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 500 tonnes annually, and enough energy production to power 100 homes. A similar project is underway in San Antonio, Texas.

Current debates surrounding plant-based biofuels focus on competition between food crops and biofuels crops, and many experts worry that high demand for biofuels will exacerbate current food shortage problems. Several projects have tackled this issue by creating biofuels from algae grown on human waste. One of these is Aquaflow Bionomic Corporation, which harvests the algae used in the sewage treatment ponds in Malborough, New Zealand. The "green crude" they create from the algae can be used for all crude-oil applications such as gasoline, diesel and plastics. In a more direct process, a Canadian company called Dynamotive Energy Systems Corporation is feeding human waste directly into a biofuels generation system using a "fast pyrolysis process". The system achieves 80% efficiency by recuperating waste gasses and heat from the process, and the end product, BioOil®, can be used as a substitute for a variety of petroleum products. One of the most high-tech, cutting-edge technologies for energy creation from human waste is the development of microbial fuel cells. Developed by Dr. Bruce Logan of Penn State's engineering department, the system has been suggested as a way to take waste treatment plants off the grid. The fuel cell, still being refined to produce an acceptable energy output, uses wastewater to generate hydrogen fuel, and clean water is produced as a by-product. While the technology is not practical for other fuel-cell applications such as hydrogen-powered cars, it can be used anywhere there is a large supply of biological waste.

Many people cringe at the thought of human waste based energy systems, and would rather not think about what happens down the pipeline, but as humanity becomes increasingly demanding of energy we must begin to embrace unconventional methods of producing it. With the increasing success of the projects mentioned exists the possibility of eliminating human waste pollution worldwide. One day our sewage may be referred to as "brown gold", and could be more valuable than even crude oil.

For more information on alternative energies, including renewable energy solutions for your home and business, please visit the Alternative Energy Weblog

Samuel_Lewis

A Look At Composting and Composting Toilets

Sometimes known as biological toilets and waterless toilets, composting toilet systems are useful when there is an urgent necessity to control the composting of toilet paper, food wastes and excrement. Composting toilet is different from the septic system because a composting toilet system is depended on conditions of unsaturated level such as the materials cannot be immersed completely in water. When operating to its full capacity, composting toilet is competent to easily break down the waste into somewhere about 10 to 30 percent of its actual volume.

Humus is the resulting end-product. Known for being a stable soil-like material, humus is required to be either buried or it has to be properly removed by a licensed seepage hauler who is familiar with the state as well as the prevailing local regulations in the U.S. but in several other countries, humus can be used as an effective soil conditioner on edible crops.

When we discuss the primary objective underlying the composting toilet system, the answer is simple: to destroy or immobilize any and every organism that is capable of causing pathogens or any kind of human disease. Composting is a savior of sorts because it ensures that the waste products don't contaminate the immediate or distant environment or harm the human inhabitants in any way.

The system should naturally be consistent with proper as well as good sanitation so that it minimizes effectively any possibility of human contact with the kind of unprocessed excrement that is being treated, Minimizing odor and producing a dry end product that doesn't pose any kind of exposure to disease vectors like flies is a matter of importance as well.

The secondary objective, as we all know, is to transform the nutrients that are present in human excrement into forms that are stable because these are then fully oxidized and can therefore, be used effectively as a kind of soil conditioner for plants as well as trees.

Here are some of the main components of a composting toilet:

-a composting reactor that gets connected to one or more of the dry or the micro-flush toilets;

-a screened exhaust system so that odors, water vapors, carbon dioxide, and so on can be minimized;

-some type of ventilation so that oxygen is provided to the aerobic organisms that are present in the composter;

• a proper way to drain and manage whatever turns out to be leachate or excess liquid;
• process controls, like mixers and
• an access door that ensures the removal of the final end-product.

With these tips, you have now understood what composting toilet is all about.

Tanner_Larsson

Eco-Toilet - Portable Composting Toilet

I have been out in the woods many times while getting the urge to empty my bowels. So, I had to find a place to do the deed and I had to find some leaves to help with the clean up. Then, out came the shovel to dig a nice little hole for my personal composting pile; small price to pay for enjoying the great outdoors. Now there is something even better.

It is an Eco-toilet, also called environmentally friendly toilets. Eco-toilets are a portable version of composting toilets. It comes in the shape of a toilet seat, a shape which we have all grown accustomed to. You put a biodegradable bag into the eco-toilet, do your deed (hopefully you remember toilet paper) and you save the bag until you get home where you put it into your compost pile. It takes about 40 days for the bag to decompose.

These eco-toilets can be taken along for long road trips through areas where rest stops are few and far between. I am willing to bet that it will cut down on speeding. I have often noticed that the speed I drive is proportional to how badly I have to visit the little boy's room. Now, I take the washroom along for the trip and my driving is much comfortable. Also, eco-toilets are often recommended as part of a disaster preparedness kit.

If used properly, eco-toilets help lower your impact on the environment by decreasing your need to use traditional flush toilets, which use four to six gallons of clean water for every flush.

Henry_Allpas