The Power of Indoor Compost

Dominic writes "Last week, a certain Sharp kitchen composter was the talk of the internet. But sadly, it used 300W of power to run! Not quite the perfect ideal of nature-friendlyness a composter ought to be. This week, Treehugger has a better model up, The Naturemill, which is actually available in North America, and only uses 4W of power. Best of all, it can still handle enough food waste for a family of 5. So you can get your compost on without all the hastle of a pile. And without the electric bills."

Comments

Just run a big pipe

[solafide]

to the compost pile just outside the house, and wash it out every once in a while. Put a grinder in, and we have the ultimate in laziness. Just throw your shredded newspaper down the pipe right before you wash it out. Problem solved. :)

Re:Forest for the trees

[M1FCJ]

I live an apartment. Interestingly enough the people who live in houses around my apartment have a spacial bin from the council where you can put your green waste in and they will compost it for you. For this service I can let them have the money they earn froms elling the compost (if it covers their costs). This was fine when I lived in a house. I year ago I moved out of that place and moved into this one. I share a closed enclosure for my rubbish and there is no way of binning the green waste properly. I don't produce much (a single geek can produce so much kitchen waste) and my habit of eating these days is reasonably healthy (lots of salads and stuff). I hardly have to empty my bin in a week (I don't produce a lot of unrecycleable stuff either, cans get recycled as does glass).

I can't handle the idea of worms in my kitchen either. It is a good idea to have for people like me.

Not attracting the woodland creatures

[Latent Heat]

When you take this ecology-woodland home-compost outside too far, you achieve a certain harmony with the woodland creatures -- the tree squirrel, the raccoon, the skunk -- and they will come to your house and invite themselves inside your house by chewing through the attic vents.

While they say you are OK if you don't have fats, meat scraps, or bones, I wonder if coffee grounds, orange and banana peels, and other compost standbys create oders that welcome these creatures. Indoor composting may be the thing to help protect your house (or a dog).

Cheaper option

[bcmm]

Why the fuck do you need electricity to compost stuff? I do it this way:

Take vegetable scraps, cardboard etc. (maybe not stuff like potatos, because they attract rats)

Put them in a large bin outside. Special compost bins are nice because you can get to the bottom of them where the stuff that has had time to decompose is.

Wait ages. Have more than one bin, so that after the first wait there is always compost available.

Re:What about vermiculture?

[bitingduck]

We have a worm bin that we use outside (warm year round) but could just as well keep inside if we needed to. They also advertise them for use by fisherman for a steady supply of cheap worms, and we sometimes give some worms to the ducks for a tasty snack (they're wild about worms).

It's also a great way to get rid of the shredded mail that you don't want to put on the curb (things that have credit card numbers, SSN, etc)-- generally after you empty a layer you want to mix bedding with the organic waste. Bedding can be shredded coconut husks, newspaper, or mail that's shredded and moistened slightly. It disappears into the compost.

Re:300w a lot of power?

[benjamindees]

300 Watts, 24 hours a day, is a ridiculous amount of power. That comes to about 216 KWh per month. Last time I checked, the average electric bill in the US was something like 300 KWh per month.

At 9 cents per KWh, that's almost $20 a month you're spending just to get a couple of pounds of compost.