Composting Toilets
Composting toilet
A friend of mine once said that the stupidest thing our culture does is put our waste into clean water. I think there are some other serious contenders for that title, but she had a point, the current system is a wasteful solution, though it’s hard to see it changing any time soon. Grist has a long article about the humanure/composting toilet movement, part 3 of a 5 part series on human waste. Personally, I would chime in that I’ve used a variety of composting toilets–they’re fairly common in some of the more off-the-grid parts of Australia and New Zealand and at the backcountry campsites here in the states, the Little Yosemite Valley campground has the best one I’ve ever used–and that the good ones are not at all unpleasant. But I shower on my front porch, so I’m not sure how much weight my opinion has on this issue.
ryan 5/7
Tags: composting toilet
This entry was posted on Saturday, May 9th, 2009 at 8:57 am and is filed under sustainability. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
May 9th, 2009 at 1:22 pm
I’m sure we can understand the reluctance of people to using them. It takes someone really off off the grid or really green (brown?). Back in the day I considered getting one - going to the outhouse in the middle of the night when it’s - 30 F. is a real eye opener.
May 10th, 2009 at 12:27 pm
They are more practical for the climate here and in Australia, but I don’t see them ever becoming widespread here either.
May 10th, 2009 at 7:26 pm
I’m encouraged that at least there are more new buildings that separate graywater from clean, and where you can flush your toilet with water from the shower (or washing machine). But I do love a flush toilet, and expect I’m going to enjoy it more and more as I grow older.