Worm Composting Toilet

When I was growing up everyone lived off grid. In fact there was no grid. A home with all the modern convinces in Kansas in the early 1940s had a well manicured path leading to the necessary room and a hand pump in the kitchen to get water. Halloween was not complete if we did not tip over someone else's out house and many an hour were spent throwing pebbles at the neighbor's outhouse door once they were ensconced inside. A lot of the fun went away when rural electrification came to our county and people had pumps, drain fields and all indoor plumbing.

Now the news is that more and more people are choosing to live off grid and the once familiar outhouse is making a come back. What makes this new toilet reformation unique is that now it is a worm composting toilet.

Prior to shifting over completely to a worm composting toilet for your family's needs it is recommended that you first gain experience with a worm bin. With this process you master the art of letting red wiggler composting worms (Eisenia foetida) dispose of your kitchen garbage.

Once you know how to do this simple project you are ready start your worm composting toilet. The worm bin is the heart of the toilet. It should be operated like any other worm bin. The major difference is that human waste has a much higher carbon to nitrogen level 20:1 so it needs a high carbon source to balance the load. Leaves, allowed to decay for a few months produce an ideal additive.

Because worm composting requires an ideal temperature of between 65 and 85 degrees F you may need to insulate the bin from cold and heat. The size of the worm bin will vary bases on the number of people supported. The worm composting toilet will support the use of bio-degradable toilet paper but not women's sanitary articles.

There are several worm composting toilets in use for the public in Vancouver's lower mainland. If you are interested in finding out more about these projects and more, they are covered in the following book. The Composting Toilet System Book: A Practical Guide to Choosing, Planning and Maintaining Composting Toilets, a Water-Saving, Pollution-Preventing Wastewater Alternative by David Del Porto and Carol Steinfeld 1999 8.5" x 11", 240 pages, 300+ photos and illustrations, Black and white with color cover.