Humanure? Composting toilets?

[Blodeuwedd]

Does anyone have composting toilets?
We are planning a move in about 6 years (time for us to pay off our home and other debts before moving) and are going to use composting toilets and composting it into humanure. My big question is we are going to have all grey water in our house filtered and pumped out (haven't completely decided what I want to use it for). My big question is, I wouldn't be able to wash cloth diapers and let the water run into the grey water system. I figured I would either wash them by hand or divert the water from the washer into a container.

The big question is, what would I do with all the water from washing them? Could I pour it into the composting piles, or would that make it too wet? I don't know how to dispose of it. Could I just build a basic outhouse to pour it down? We are planning on having electric in combination with a solar well pump, grey water system, wood furnace, and composting the toilets. Eventually we will add in a solar panel system, but the electric for the beginning will be for appliances and what not.

[bluefish]

We have a sawdust toilet and our greywater goes into a pit filled with sawdust. Greywater comes from one sink, one bathtub and the washer. When I had a little one in cloth diapers, I just dumped the poo from the diaper into the toilet and then washed the diapers in the washer.

If you're going to handwash, you could certainly dump the water on the compost pile, just watch and see if it's getting to wet. It will depend on the size of your pile, your climate and how often/how much water the diaper washing uses. If the pile becomes too wet, I would be perfectly comfortable dumping the water anywhere out of the yard/off the beaten path. If it has lots of solids, maybe dig a hole, dump it and fill the hole again. It somewhat depends on your circumstances and comfort level.

Filtering and pumping the grey water seems a lot of effort. I obviously don't know your circumstances or intended setup, but it would be easier in the long run (I think) if you could direct it to a pit or to a plant/plants around the house that would need watering, if possible.

[DEKE01]

If by filtering you mean running grey or black water thru a big pile of sawdust or wood chips, great. It would take a large pile, but I think a 100 cubic yards pile of chips would be able to handle what ever your home would generate in the course of a year. After that, you would have good compost (wait 6 months after the last addition of humanure before using) and you would need to start with a new pile.

My 100 yards is in my SWAG over estimation of what you would need. It is a lot of chips. In sawdust you could probably cut that down by more than half.

You don't say where you live, but if it is PNW and you have tons of rain, the water in your greywater may be a bigger problem than the poo.

[Buffy in Dallas]

Go here- http://oasisdesign.net/greywater/

Buy this- http://oasisdesign.net/greywater/createanoasis/

Read

[Shrek]

In reality anyone who has a septic tank and drain field has a composting toilet system as the water dispelled by the drain field lines is gray water that has been anaerobically decomposed by the enzymes and bacteria in the septic tank.

Although not good for the septic system drain tiles to garden on a drain field as some crop roots as fruit tree roots can clog the drainage lines some people, especially living small suburban tracts have been known to plant gardens successfully on a down hill grade next to their septic drain field lines if their property space allows.

Another concern to consider when trying to pursue the "humanure" compost concept or placing a garden in proximity to a drain field gray water source is that while folks of past eras commonly added the composted contents of their outhouse to their crop areas in the last 30 years pharmaceutical contamination has become more of an environmental concern issue.

Human waste as canine and feline wastes contain higher heavy metal type contamination content in addition to residual medication traces that survive normal decomposition processes.

Many folks who utilize the humanure waste compost tactic do not take into consideration medications their family may be prescribed and unless the book on the subject that I read about 20 years ago has been revised, it didn't address prescription medication traces in human wastes either.

Human wastes processed by municipal grade sewage systems go through multiple years of anaerobic and aerobic composting and pasteurization processing before being made available for agricultural use from what I read in one of our agricultural department newsletters a few years back.

Composting human waste while possible and pursued by many has aspects to be taken into consideration beyond the usual aspects of a common lawn and garden waste composting approach.

[DEKE01]

Originally Posted by Shrek

In reality anyone who has a septic tank and drain field has a composting toilet system as the water dispelled by the drain field lines is gray water that has been anaerobically decomposed by the enzymes and bacteria in the septic tank.

Although not good for the septic system drain tiles to garden on a drain field as some crop roots as fruit tree roots can clog the drainage lines some people, especially living small suburban tracts have been known to plant gardens successfully on a down hill grade next to their septic drain field lines if their property space allows.

Another concern to consider when trying to pursue the "humanure" compost concept or placing a garden in proximity to a drain field gray water source is that while folks of past eras commonly added the composted contents of their outhouse to their crop areas in the last 30 years pharmaceutical contamination has become more of an environmental concern issue.

Human waste as canine and feline wastes contain higher heavy metal type contamination content in addition to residual medication traces that survive normal decomposition processes.

Many folks who utilize the humanure waste compost tactic do not take into consideration medications their family may be prescribed and unless the book on the subject that I read about 20 years ago has been revised, it didn't address prescription medication traces in human wastes either.

Human wastes processed by municipal grade sewage systems go through multiple years of anaerobic and aerobic composting and pasteurization processing before being made available for agricultural use from what I read in one of our agricultural department newsletters a few years back.

Composting human waste while possible and pursued by many has aspects to be taken into consideration beyond the usual aspects of a common lawn and garden waste composting approach.

The link states that the USDA and National Academy of Sciences have found no verifiable link between composted humanure and the problems you cite. There are quite a few environmentalists who have sounded the alarm with anecdotal stories, but science, at this time, is on the side of poo.


is-it-safe-to-use-compost-made-from-treated-human-waste

[Astrid]

We use a humanure system. Look at this link: http://humanurehandbook.com/

YouTube

It works very well for us.

[Blodeuwedd]

We are going to do the basic sawdust composting toilets. We currently live in NW Pennsylvania, we may stay around here, but we want at least 10 acres and there isn't a lot of affordable land around us, so we are looking at Kentucky, West Virginia! And maybe Ohio. There won't be any septic system, so the grey water wouldn't have any human waste in it aside from cloth diaper waste (which all solids would be scraped into the buckets first).

I saw some filtering tanks, but I mainly wanted to pump it out into maybe a field or clearing. I was looking into the filtering system, because it can go directly into a pond.

On the note of prescription drugs no one in my family has to take any long term and hopefully really never will (aside from something that is short term).

We do have cats, however I haven't done much research yet on what to do with their poo.

[DEKE01]

Originally Posted by Blodeuwedd

We are going to do the basic sawdust composting toilets. We currently live in NW Pennsylvania, we may stay around here, but we want at least 10 acres and there isn't a lot of affordable land around us, so we are looking at Kentucky, West Virginia! And maybe Ohio. There won't be any septic system, so the grey water wouldn't have any human waste in it aside from cloth diaper waste (which all solids would be scraped into the buckets first).

I saw some filtering tanks, but I mainly wanted to pump it out into maybe a field or clearing. I was looking into the filtering system, because it can go directly into a pond.

On the note of prescription drugs no one in my family has to take any long term and hopefully really never will (aside from something that is short term).

We do have cats, however I haven't done much research yet on what to do with their poo.

cat poo...compost it. As long as it is a big pile, sits a long time, and gets hot for a few days, there is nothing wrong with it.

All animal waste gets broken down one way or another, the compost pile just speeds the process.

[Blodeuwedd]

Would the type of litter I use affect the compost pile? I use the scoop-able kind now and it is clay based... I love it way too much to switch. But I can always switch to a paper product or even wood if I can convince them to use it. They are both little royalty and like things to be their way. The scoop-able clay based litter probably has tons of nasty chemicals in it.

[bluefish]

Originally Posted by Blodeuwedd

Would the type of litter I use affect the compost pile? I use the scoop-able kind now and it is clay based... I love it way too much to switch. But I can always switch to a paper product or even wood if I can convince them to use it. They are both little royalty and like things to be their way. The scoop-able clay based litter probably has tons of nasty chemicals in it.

I use the same sawdust that we use for the toilet for the litterbox. It didn't take them too long to get used to it. I simply locked the cat in a large crate with a sawdust filled litterbox for a few days. They got the idea. Sawdust deals with odor way better than unscented clay cat litter. I never could stand the scented stuff, so no experience there.

I throw everything in my compost bin. Our toilet buckets, cat litter, dog poop, dead animals (I have small piles and can only fit something up the size of a goat in there), etc. Anything that will rot. There's even a few cloth diapers in there that simply became too wore out to even use as rags anymore. The pile gets fairly hot and sits for about a year. Never seen any evidence of dog and cat poo and the only thing left of the animals is bones.

[DEKE01]

I just went to Scoop-away's website to read the ingredients. They don't tell everything, but animals can eat it in small amounts, but because it is mostly clay, it could stop the animals bowels if they ate a lot of it. It contains Zeolite which people eat as a detox formula.

So at least for that brand, I can't find anything that would make we not want to compost it. However, if your soil is already heavy with clay, you are adding more clay which might not be helping lighten your soil. Where I live, my soil is all sand so any clay I can find is a plus.

[GeneMO]

We have an outhouse at our hunting cabin. But at times a month may pass without a use. Very intermittant. Then when we have our quarterly target shoots, fix-up-days there may be 4 or 5 guys there for 3-4 days.

We placed the outhouse up on two concrete blocks on the back to level it out. The waste falls right on top of the ground. We have used it that way since 1995. No smell, no build up, No problem. Works its way into the soil.

I you used it on a regular basis, you would want to dig a hole of some sorts. The old timers used "Quick lime". Sprinkled that on every so often. As long as you are not in a situation to where it will get in drinking water, the soil will absorb it.

I am not hard up enough for fertillizer to mess with human poo. I'll leave that up to the Vietnamese.

Gene

[DEKE01]

digging a hole is the wrong thing to do. Poo stinks because of a lack of oxygen and carbon. In a hole, the water collects which drives out O2 and creates stinky anaerobic conditions. aerobic conditions, as exist in a good compost pile, absorb and convert the smell to fertilizer.

[kasilofhome]

Americas use human waste too.

[Astrid]

Have any of you thought of a methane composting system? We are looking at this one: http://hestiahomebiogas.com/products/ You would be able to compost any fecal matter whether it be cat, dog, horse, cow or human. We saw systems like this in India and China that work well enough to provide methane for a gas burner or two.

[Rustaholic]

Originally Posted by thermopkt

I use the same sawdust that we use for the toilet for the litterbox. It didn't take them too long to get used to it. I simply locked the cat in a large crate with a sawdust filled litterbox for a few days. They got the idea. Sawdust deals with odor way better than unscented clay cat litter. I never could stand the scented stuff, so no experience there.

I throw everything in my compost bin. Our toilet buckets, cat litter, dog poop, dead animals (I have small piles and can only fit something up the size of a goat in there), etc. Anything that will rot. There's even a few cloth diapers in there that simply became too wore out to even use as rags anymore. The pile gets fairly hot and sits for about a year. Never seen any evidence of dog and cat poo and the only thing left of the animals is bones.

We have three cats in the house and we heat the house by cutting up used shipping pallets. There are small sawdust piles here and there. We MUST keep them covered or all three cats will use them instead of the four litter boxes with the clay based litter in them. No training needed.

[kasilofhome]

Originally Posted by thermopkt

I use the same sawdust that we use for the toilet for the litterbox. It didn't take them too long to get used to it. I simply locked the cat in a large crate with a sawdust filled litterbox for a few days. They got the idea. Sawdust deals with odor way better than unscented clay cat litter. I never could stand the scented stuff, so no experience there.

I throw everything in my compost bin. Our toilet buckets, cat litter, dog poop, dead animals (I have small piles and can only fit something up the size of a goat in there), etc. Anything that will rot. There's even a few cloth diapers in there that simply became too wore out to even use as rags anymore. The pile gets fairly hot and sits for about a year. Never seen any evidence of dog and cat poo and the only thing left of the animals is bones.

I use pellets made of wood shaving ...it's really fine...it is made for animals like horses , very absorbent ....no older issue.

[Forerunner]

Originally Posted by thermopkt

I throw everything in my compost bin. Our toilet buckets, cat litter, dog poop, dead animals (I have small piles and can only fit something up the size of a goat in there), etc. Anything that will rot. There's even a few cloth diapers in there that simply became too wore out to even use as rags anymore. The pile gets fairly hot and sits for about a year. Never seen any evidence of dog and cat poo and the only thing left of the animals is bones.

Very healthy attitude and practice toward composting, if I do say so, myself.

Now build a pile big enough to at least bury a cow, already.

[BohemianWaxwing]

We also use the simplest "humanure handbook" sawdust bucket composting system in both our 1 acre lot, in-town bathrooms. Everything goes in our compost pile from chicken coop cleanings to the neighbor dogs poo (since he insists on using my postaget stamp lawn instead of his own 1 acre of unused lawn space anyway). A properly managed pile has no smell and no flies. You should be fine to dump the diaper wash water there as well. If you get too wet, just start another leaf/mulch pile nearby to accomodate. As others have said, digging holes is both too much work and puts the nutrients you're after out of reach of most plants and puts the pathogens out of reach of the surface level soil bacteria that will help to kill them off.

Regarding grey water I think you should do a lot more research. Pumping it is almost never a good plan. Buy and read the Create an Oasis with Greywater book BiD recommended. It's well worth the price of purchase and will save you a lot of money and headache if you're planning a greywater system that involves pumps.

Your plans sound very similar to what we're working toward with our lot in TN. You're wise to be thinking this hard about systems even years before you're planning to move. Try as many as you can out now so that you'll know which ones work. Simpler is almost always better...