What is a composting Toilet?

A composting toilet is a waterless human waste management system that will turn your human waste into safe and easy to handle compost. It's popular eco friendly alternative when there is no access to a traditional sewer or septic system.

In nature when animals poop, their waste naturally goes through the composting process, creating nutritious soil for the plants around them. Compost toilets accelerates the natural 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.

Understandably, the idea of dealing with human waste is not something anyone looks forward to, but if your system is set up properly, you should be handling a safe, nutrient rich soil, like garden compost. There should be no detection of human waste sight or smell.

Benefits of owning a composting toilet

Conservation of water.

The average toilet today uses about 1.6 gallons, thanks to advancements in low-flush technology. Older toilets can use as many as 7 gallons. Can you imagine how many gallons of clean drinking water per day a family of four uses just to flush waste? That's in one house, but imagine millions of homes in a single city, all flushing various times per day. All that water and waste is pushed through to a waste processing plant, where chemicals are used to clean the water and the cycle starts over.

Easy clean up.

There will be no need for scrubbing brushes and harmful chemicals. Most users just use a little vinegar, water, and paper towel to clean their compost toilets.

Never worry about clogged toilet

There's nothing to flush, so there are no pipes for waste to get stuck in. You won't even need to own a plunger. When you look at the typical toilet, the bowl is large enough for everything to get in, but then compacts it to fit through the pipes, sometimes resulting in a clog and all kinds of stains and messes left behind on the porcelain. That's not how composting toilets operate, so there's never a clog.

Easy to Install.

Most compost toilets can be installed by someone with beginner skills, unlike traditional toilets that require plumbing and specialty hardware. They are also relatively inexpensive compared to a new septic system.

Free Compost:

Your waste goes back into growing plants into nature without creating sewage.

No Bathroom poo lingering smell: When set up properly most compost toilets result in an earthy smell but should not smell of black water or sewage.

Challenges of a composting toilet:

Learning to use the toilet. Depending on the toilet, the user may take a couple of uses before they get used to using the toilet and maintaining it. Some compost toilets are Urine diverting (such as the Nature's Head and Separett), and that takes a bit of practice for men and women to use it. Certain ones recommend peeing sitting down for both men and women. Others such as a the Sun-Mar and Biolet require scooping maintaining the drum with compost medium.

Teaching house guest to use the toilet can be awkward. Not everyone is comfortable with having to use a new thing, especially when it comes to a toilet. And you can't exactly hand hold a house guest while teaching them to use your compost toilet. Compost toilets are definitely a conversation piece, especially for the unconverted.

Compost toilets require power and venting. Unlike traditional toilets, composting toilets do require power to help vent and dry out the solids in the composting toilet. A lot of the toilets can be integrated with a solar setup or connected to a 12v battery. The fans or heaters have to be running 24/7 while in use. The fans/heater have to be on in order for the solids to be processed. If you have limited power bank you would need to consider this when installing a compost toilet.

Initial costs are higher than traditional toilet. But this is only true if you have access to septic. If you don't have access to a septic, a compost toilet is much cheaper. Compost toilets don't use water and the installation costs are cheaper. Overall, there is very little ongoing costs.

How do composting toilets work?

There are three essential functions of a composting toilet that all true compost toilets share. While different brand, make and models of toilets may approach these three fundamental functions differently, the core three functions are always the same, evaporate the moisture, break down solid waste without odor, and produce compost that is safe to handle.

1. Evaporate moisture from the waste
2. Breaks down the solid waste without smell
3. Produce finished usable compost that is safe and easy to handle.

It's also important to know that depending on your toilet, the end compost product is not happen inside the toilet due to size or design of the unit. At this point it is easier to have an external compost pile. There the partially compost pile can have the time to break down.

No matter what type of composting toilet you get, they all work in similar ways. Each toilet is designed so the waste can be quickly processed to allow for quick and odor-free decomposition. The goal is to maintain a ecosystem which turns your human waste into usable compost.

Composting toilets have several ways to create and sustain this environment for your waste to breakdown. With fans, venting, separation trays, heating elements, evaporation chambers, and rotation, your compost toilet works hard to insure the right amount of moisture exists for your toilet chamber.

What are some compost toilet options?

Nature's Head Toilet:

Nature's Head toilet was first designed in 2006 by two long time sailors. Originally designed to be used in harsh marine environment, the Nature's Head can be used anywhere plumbing or electricity is limited or non-existent. The waterless design requires no water for flushing which not only requires no plumbing, but is also eco-responsible. There is no odor, due to the separation of liquid and solid wastes.

This dry, urine-diverting composting toilet is simple to install. It's simple, durable, and reliable design will provide generations of trouble-free use in any application.

Loveable Loo (DIY Compost Toilet)

The Loveable Loo is a permanent wooden toilet for either indoor or outdoor use. It is probably the simplest and cheapest of all the toilets out there. It's essentially a 5-gallon bucket inside a wooden box with a toilet seat covering the hole. There's no use of electricity, plumbing, chemicals, venting, or water.

Because the Loveable Loo is little more than a bucket with a seat, it doesn't have the other benefits you'll find with a composting toilet. In fact, it's not a composting toilet at all. It takes the same basic idea and ingredients (for preventing smells), but will require you to empty the bucket in a separate compost bin. Which means you MUST have a compost bin to store it.

Sun-Mar Started in 1971, the Sun-Mar was the first self-contained toilet that can evaporate liquids and compost solids. Sun-Mar Centrex systems are one of the only NSF (National Sanitation Foundation) certified. The Sun-Mar offers a self-contained toilet system for those without sewer or septic hookups.

The Sun Mar separates liquids from solids after entering the main composting chamber. The solids pass into the finishing drawer once broken down and liquids are evaporated away by heating tray and by an internal vent fan. When the liquids are evaporated off, then the solids are moved to the "finishing drawer" as they break down and are ready to be removed.

Separett

The Separett Villa is a urine-diverting compost toilet that's well suited for stationary applications, but simply plumbing the liquids drain to a suitable black water storage tank makes it fit right into any mobile application, such as in an RV, camper, or tiny home. That is why the Separett composting toilets are quickly gaining in popularity with the mobile and tiny home crowd.

Compost toilets can be a bit intimating in the beginning, but with all of its benefits and flexibility it is a really great eco-friendly solution to something you use everyday. Instead of creating more waste, why not give back to the earth?