Update on Composting Toilet

hello Mag,

i read your march 2005 article on the composting

toilet.   i tried to find some follow-up material on

it, concerning your installation and experience(s)

with it, but couldn't find anything further on your

toolgirl website (maybe i didn't do a good enough job

of looking, eh?)

i'm just curious how it went.   was it worth what you

paid for it?   how was the installation?   did it work

according to the propaganda?   are you satisfied with

it?   will you keep it?

thanks.

christopher

Dear Christopher,

Thanks for asking.  Every morning I hot-foot it up the hill from the writing studio to the house to use the bathroom.  At least twice.  I have a number of reasons: 

1. I drink a lot of green tea.
2. I'm not a drop 'em and wee-in-the-field type of girl, mostly because the guy next door has a telescope.
3. I haven't installed the composting toilet in the studio bathroom yet.

I'm afraid that the lovely, pristine, waterless, non-electric Envirolet composting unit is still in its box in the garage.  I have a number of excuses.

1. There is no floor in the studio bathroom yet.
2. There's stinging nettle growing behind the barn where I have to dig the French drain (the hole that accepts all the liquid waste from the toilet) so I'm waiting for the nettle to die.
3. A psychic told me that I'm not going to be motivated to get the bathroom finished until it's too damn cold to scuttle up the hill in service to my bladder.

As it happens, there have been legitimate distractions this summer including carpenter ants, roof repairs and a raccoon that tunnelled under the floor of the cabin and had to be evicted.  (TIP:  Tune the radio to headbanger rock 'n' roll 24 hours a day.  If that doesn't work, give all visiting male friends and relatives lots of beer and persuade them to urinate around the edges of the cabin.  An old mammalian trick I learned from an old mammal  -  Farley Mowat.)

As soon as the bathroom floor is in and the French drain is sitting pretty, I will post an arty photographic essay of the composting toilet installation.

Comments

[CJH]

I am looking at self-contained, waterless composting toilets for my home. How was your experience with your composting toilet?