What is a Composting Toilet?
How is composting toilet different from a traditional toilet?
Compost toilets are a good alternative to traditional toilets.
Composting toilets are the modern alternative. A composting toilet it water-less and will turn your human waste into safe and usable compost. The compost toilet takes the waste just like the flush toilet. The main difference is that the waste is stored and requires someone to regularly turn or spin it to help the composting process along. Just like a regular garden composter, the compost in the toilet needs to be turned to help the waste break down faster. In order to help the compost process along and keep the smell manageable, you will have to add additional materials into the compost contained area. Depending on the type of toilet you have this can range from peat moss, sawdust, or even popcorn.
Compost toilets are very popular among the off-grid, mobile, and tiny home community.
Depending on your needs and environment there is a composting toilet for you. If your toilet is on the move and mobile, you will need a toilet that can handle violent motion or jarring motion without splashing, spilling or leaking. Nature's Head dry composting toilet was originally designed for boats and is one of our many toilets that works well on the road. Often times, water is a valuable resource, so having a water-less toilet system means that you can avoid flushing water down the toilet. Composting toilets help you save water while providing an essential need, to help you make a home where ever you are. Composting toilets recycles your waste into a usable fertilizer.
Now for those that aren't familiar, compost is nutrient rich soil used in gardens that is created through the process of composting. Composting is the natural process of recycling organic material (in this case human waste). Through this process, the human waste decays into an organic material that is used as a plant fertilizer.
In nature when animals poop, their waste naturally goes through the composting process, creating nutritious soil for the plants around them. The compost toilet just accelerates the process by removing the moisture from the poop, creating an environment for microbial activity, mixing with the oxygen to cause a temperature increase. This process kills the harmful pathogens through aerobic decomposition. So when used correctly, composting toilets can turn your human poop into fertilizing soil.
To get an idea of what compost toilets are out there check out our compost toilet page.
If you are physiologically unable to separate poop from urine, does that mean you cannot use a composting toilet – or are there other types?
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