By Ruben Anderson, The Tyee. Posted July 17, 2008.
"Composting is key to reducing waste costs, cutting global warming emissions, and increasing urban food security. "
Local composting: pick your method
Why not build a composting system that does not rely on a constant river of oil, and start saving part of that $15 per tonne -- not to mention lowering our greenhouse gas emissions, cutting down on carcinogenic particulates and reducing the number of noisy trucks waking us in the morning?
To cut back on fossil fuels, everything needs to be on a walkable scale. This will require several kinds of composting systems, depending on the neighbourhood density.
Many cities offer subsidized backyard composters and balcony worm bins, and this obviously needs to continue. Nothing could be better than closing the loop right at home -- eat food, compost scraps, spread compost on your garden, eat more food.
The next scale up would require small apartment buildings to compost on site. If a row of three or four backyard composters won't keep up with the organic flow, small automatic composters use an electric heater to accelerate composting and an auger to automatically turn the compost, producing finished compost in two weeks.
For still larger buildings, industrial scale worm composters can really chew through the food. The Mount Nelson Hotel in South Africa uses worms to make short work of leftovers from the artichoke and asparagus assiette.