A Gardening Controversy Part 1: The Rise of the Indoor Composters
Composting is a very useful part of gardening. It is a decomposition process in which various scraps can be turned into nutritious soil via organic processes that involve microorganisms, heat, water, and even bugs/animals. There are a variety of methods for composting from cold compost, hot compost, vermicompost, and leaf mold. With more people looking at home gardening, there have been some companies that have begun to apply technology to the composting process and have recently released products for indoor composting. When a couple of these devices hit the market, it appeared to cause some controversy among gardeners. Why would anyone want this sort of appliance when they can just toss scraps out back for free? It is an obvious point to make, so let me share my thoughts on the topic. I will be doing more blogs on the topic as I go as well.
Convenience- If the electronic composters do what they claim, it is extremely convenient. Two composters currently available (ex. Lomi and Reencle), claim to create usable compost within a 24-hour period. That sure beats the 6 weeks to multiple months of work of composting processes outdoors. I personally have worked very hard this year trying to learn hot composting that I could never get going. I read books, watched videos, took others' advice, and could never get a compost pile to heat up. I had to try and think up ways to get into the carbon side of it as well because I just don't have any leaves to use. If these composters do as they say, then this saves me a lot of angst as well.
Space saving- Let's face it. Not everyone has acres of land to place compost piles and be all set. Some people live in apartments and grow on their balconies or inside. I live in a suburb with some yard outback. There is no way I can have rotting food where neighbors can see and smell it, let alone any animal attraction, even when covered with dirt. A proper compost pile also has to be a certain size in order to make the process work appropriately, ideally a 4 cu ft area where the indoor composters can work daily to process through smaller piles.
No interruption of the decomposition cycle-When I read a very scientifically specific book on the process of composting, it indicated that whenever you add any new scraps to the pile, it can start the whole process all over again with the microbes, and compost needs a curing time to be fully ready without causing plant damage. The indoor composters may keep this from being an issue as they run through full cycles.
"Green Bins" are not available-Apparently there are some places that have "green bin" services. Where your food wastes get collected by the city who then may provide compost back to the person. While this may be a convenient option for some, it is not an available service everywhere (I am also not sure all those places that do has "free" compost return either).
You can put in meat waste-Most outdoor compost piles should not contain meat due to needing very consistent heat in order to compost them down. It can also attract a variety of animals to the pile. The indoor composters are able to accept meat waste.
Arguments I have heard against these kinds of products:
They can't possibly make real compost-Per the companies that are selling these items, they do indeed create a useable compost. Reencle, for example, displays their received certifications and provides soil testing results of their product's compost. These companies claim that they have created products that provide microorganisms an ideal environment to quickly process food into compost. You also have to take into account that we are talking about much smaller lots of food waste processed daily vs a larger compost pile.
Because they use electricity, they negate any pro-environment impact-The products use 1 Kwh of electricity for composting. I am not all into the carbon footprint craze personally though, but I figure that it is less stuff going into landfills that are carried by trucks and then moved around by trucks at the landfill and instead the compost can go into my soil instead of chemical fertilizers, so I am personally not all concerned.
The price tag is too high-I will say that I think the new tech cost can be a barrier. It is new tech coming out, and only a couple of companies are delivering it and I believe that is how new tech usually starts with a higher price (think about CD players when they first came out). If the products are good and the demand increases, prices should come down over time.
Overall, I am interested in indoor composters because I find the prospect of what they do to be very enticing for me. I will fully admit that I have purchased one that I hope to review for all of you when I get it. There will be more blog posts to come, so I hope you enjoy the content. :)