sawdust toilet (in leiu of a outhouse)

[altaoaks]

i opened my mother earth news newsletter tonight to see an article on a sawdust toilet.  did anyone else see this? 

it got me thinking about the issues with outhouses, specifically that they are not permitted in many areas.  i was thinking that those outhouses could still be built, but instead of a hole in the ground they could be fitted with a bucket of sawdust and a container of sawdust inside for layering.  maybe even a hinged door in the back or the top could lift up for dumping the bucket.

the tiolet they showed was actually an old plactic water hose container fitted with a toilet seat, and a 5 gallon bucket inside and i guess you start with a layer of sawdust, then after each use you add another layer of sawdust until near full and dump in a non-garden composting area.  they said it doesnt stink?

well, it just occured to me that it could be fitted into a outhouse.  then when the inspector says no, its not an outhouse, its a sawdust composting toilet made to look like the old outhouse!  

[fastpoke]

We have been using the "humanure" system for 3 years now. works great. Now that the cabin is built, the better half wants me to put a composting toilet in. If it was my choice, I'd put one of these in the cabin and keep the $1200 in my pocket. We're used to sh*ttin in a bucket, but she is concerned for the guests. We'll still keep the out house fitted with bucket to keep the volume down during the summer months when we get most visitors though. Very good system, after the first time you clean the buckets, the rest is gravy.

Fastpoke

[Mike KY]

I've used sawdust toilets quite a bit and think it's a great way to go. They only stink when there's too much urine in them. Guys should pee outside, girls too for that matter...They decompose more quickly if you use forest duff/leaf mulch instead of sawdust, has lots more bacteria and fungi than fresh sawdust. The main resource on sawdust toilets is the humanure handbook by joe jenkins. I saw a presentation he gave once, it was hilarious.

[altaoaks]

thats really awsome to hear from real people that they are a good solution.  my mind keeps going back to david when he was getting his building inspections done and the inspector spotted his great outhouse and told him it wasnt legal to have outhouses in that county, and to remove it.  that after all his labor, time and materials the outhouse was history.  it would have been great to retrofit to a "humanure" outhouse.  that should circumvent that rediculous county ordinance.  i plan on an outhouse on the back side of the property, and that seems like a very green and friendly way to do it.  i especially like the suggestion of using leaf mulch.  sawdust is not readily available, but mulch in the country or mountains is plentiful...except when it snows! 

[Squirl]

For sawdust, you should check craigslist, or look up local saw mills in the phonebook.  Or you could even post an add on craigslist.  I have seen a pickup truck load go for $15-$30 in my area.

http://sacramento.craigslist.org/tls/2145051331.html

I have seen designs that people have built on the web.  IIRC, one person built a flip top box with a toilet seat.  They added a sliding door to cover the bucket and seal the box when not in use.  They then vented the box like a composting toilet.

[altaoaks]

squirl, i would not have even thought about buying sawdust!!  who would think that would be a commodity?  but its a great thought.  just goes to show that anything you dont use can be sold to someone who has a need.

thats really cool about the toilet with a sliding door, people are really ingenoius when given an opportunity.  i just love the idea of a real outhouse that looks very old and barnwood like with the half moon slot, but not with the issues of a hole in the ground or the stinch.  this does get the best of both worlds!

thanks for that link, i enjoyed that!

[rocking23nf]

sounds kinda green to me, ill stick with the flushing toilet

[poppy]

I get cedar shavings for free from the local Amish saw mill for my "bucket."

One of the dumbest things we do in this world is use drinking water to flush human waste into something, expecially if that something is to a central waste treatment plant.  Then we spend millions to treat it so that we can dump it into our waterways inorder to pump it out again and treat it once again to drink!   

Unfortunately, most states and counties require at least a septic system, even if there is not a water hook up.

[glenn kangiser]

Why does this thread make me think of a loo?

Stinkerbell,  Nethog... can you help me?  

[altaoaks]

poppy, you are really correct, why we do it the way we do is bizzare.  now if you have a set-up with grey water for toilets then it makes more sense to me.  but flushing is so nice and tidy!  i guess i dont want a strictly sawdust or composting set-up, i want flush toilets for most of the needs, but i like the thought of a outhouse but used with a sawdust bucket instead of a hole,   well i guess its just me being me, i want it all!

glen, it should remind you of a lou, or a louie, or a bummer buddy!  i dont mean to be potty mouthed!

[MountainDon]

Loo is British slang for the toilet.  Also known as the bog in some circles.

[hpinson]

It's a very relevant topic especially if you have a limited water resource on your property.

I've explored this a bit with the New Mexico Environment Department, who is the permitting agency for liquid waste disposal. In New Mexico, you need to have your waste disposal permit squared away with NMED before the State/County will issue a build permit.

NMED Overview:

http://www.nmenv.state.nm.us/fod/liquidwaste/

There is a variance procedure for alternate disposal systems:

http://www.nmenv.state.nm.us/fod/liquidwaste/documents/AttCNMEDLWVarianceApplicationSubmittalChecklist.pdf

NMED does address some alternative liquid waste disposal technologies:

http://www.nmenv.state.nm.us/fod/liquidwaste/documents/AlternativetoConventionalGuidance9-08.pdf

http://www.nmenv.state.nm.us/fod/liquidwaste/documents/ATSreportWTAC2.pdf

There is an approved list of alternate disposal options, and these seem costly:

http://www.nmenv.state.nm.us/fod/liquidwaste/advsys.pdf

As far as I can tell, composting IS NOT addressed as an option in any NM state regulations.

I had an informal conversation on composting toilets with a NMED staff member on this.  The long and short was that composting might be allowed on a case by case basis, if it were a commercial composting toilet device as available from Sunmar and Envirolet. Concerns were that auxiliary heat was needed to keep the commercial systems working in the winter (Sunmar, etc), that composting tends to not work so well in a very dry environment, and that humans not be in a position of handling human waste, as in the Jenkins Humanure system, where buckets must be transferred to a compost pile. Personally I think all these issues are well addressed by Jenkins.

On a positive note, NMED informally seemed willing to explore composting, probably because water is an increasingly precious resource in the Southwest, and alternatives to the septic will most certainly be needed in New Mexico before too long. I have no idea what it would take to get such a system through the NMED... it is still in never heard of it / does bnot compute land in the minds of regulators.

Another positive note is that New Mexico has modified its Greywater policy, from not allowed at all, to some workable regulations. They are not as progressive as Arizona's but nevertheless, greywater disposal is now legal in NM

http://www.nmenv.state.nm.us/fod/LiquidWaste/EIB.graywater.pdf

The Humanure book is online here:

http://humanurehandbook.com/contents.html

[hpinson]

Two more resources for those interested:

Humanure discussion forum:

http://www.jenkinspublishing.com/messages/

Regulatory discussion, by state:

http://www.jenkinspublishing.com/messages/

[altaoaks]

i had no idea that NM was so far behind in the composting toilets or the grey water.  i guess i just figured they were way ahead of the game.  it looks like they are seriously micro-managing these areas.

you would think especially with the grey water that an area that is so much of a high desert with water issues that they would have been encouraging grey water solutions.

i remember growing up the several outhouses on my aunts ranch in McAllister, NM.  and of course the ranch had been there since NM was a territory so septic, ect was before there were regulations, but i remember when she had to shut down the well by the main house when it was found that the septic had leached into the well water.  even then it was she who had the water tested and she who decieded to shut down the well.  there was no intervention by a state agency. 

well, i guess like with all such county or state agencies there are good things they do, and the rediculous.

im wondering why it is that composting toilets are thought not to work in dry environments?  it seems to me that the weather in NM would be good for composting in most areas.  the work fine in many areas with snow and cold, and in the heat especially given the rain throught the hot season.  this NMED is a new agency for me, and they seem to be not very progressive.

[glenn kangiser]

Micromanaging creates revenue for parasitic government agencies.

Denying alternatives gives puppets a sense of power over you and a feeling of worth.

Logic alone cannot explain their motives and reasons for denial and considerations of alternative methods.

[paul s]

Just a word of caution to all.  First there is no way to safely "compost" human waste.  I can be safely destroyed in a solar oven.  these are the facts presented to me at a workshop I attended last April.  Cholera can exist for 7 years if not exposed to high temperatures.

I am notsaying it has ever happened but a man with hepititus can pee on an apple tree and another person can eat one of its apples and get hepetitus.  again It likely has nver happened but could.

I deal with Class Two [grey water] and Class Three "sanitary sewer"  water damages in my job.  I take all the necessary prrecautions with personal protective equipment and have the necessay chemicals  on the truch to handle the situation.  And no Clorox bleach does not get the job done.  You need hospital grade microbial disinfectants.

If you want to keep up with the safety of human manure and composting toilets I would track the work of John Jeavons who has studied extensively and is very interested in finding a solution to return human waste to the soil.

I understand you are all interested in mainly a toilet and not actually using the compost from it.

[MountainDon]

Thanks paul s.

I know that the only time the waste from our composting toilet gets hot enough to destroy pathogens is when I incinerate it. 

[lauerpower]

could a person who wants to use a composting bin for compost on gardens.  incenerate there pile from time to time? and then use on gardens.

[hpinson]

My understanding is the Jenkens does not recommend the use of human compost on food crops due to the concerns raised by Paul.  Hepatitus is not something to be messed with, and there is an awful lot of it around.

Personally my interest is from the standpoint of low water consumption, rather than using the compost for some sort of permaculture endeavor. My well does maybe 1/2 gallon a minute and the water is precious.  I may have no choice but to go the septic route regardless, due to the regs.

From what i've read, what Mountain Don describes is the problem with the commercial composting toilets-- not enough heat is generated to thoroughly compost, and this gets worse at in a cold climate-- winters in NM are cold at 6000ft to 9000ft. The system Jenkens describes generates more heat, but you need more volume (not great for low use cabins) and you have to handle the waste (empty and clean the buckets).  

[altaoaks]

glen, i could not agree with you more.  i really hate to think of our local govt in that light, (or rather dark), but its true, every last word of it.

paul s. i see where you are coming from, but i frankly would not care to use human waste in my garden, so i would look at, as was suggested, an area where maybe slash is burned so it would be incinerated.  i know a lot of people are needing systems that do not need a septic.  for me personally, were putting in the septic, and the retrofitted outhouse will be on the other side of the property, and for use until the septic is in. 

i guess there are real concerns, but if people are educated to the dangers, they can and will use care.

lauerpower, i think the whole idea of adding compost is to infuse the soil with nutrients, so if you incenerate it, you have no nutrients, just fill.  seems counter-productive.

there must be a good solution to the issues.  what that is i dont know.  i guess do not use in garden areas, or where kids or pets play, use very good gloves and maybe a mask when handling buckets of human waste,  question...could it be burried, or put into a burn barrel and incenerated?

[UK4X4]

 "it can be safely destroyed in a solar oven."


I've been juggling the idea of using a fresnal lens array to heat water

large steel drum with a curved array of medium size fresnal lens's,


How to distribute the high temperatures is an issue........as it can produce rather high temperatures


mmmmm a fresnel lens poop incinerator !

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qY_Ka1dBlW8

is a 1000 deg  enough ?

[paul s]

lauerpower  if you burn your compost u will have ashes now if there is anything bad there it could be concentrated.  I never use ashes on my garden {ashes are a whoe other subject} the value of compost is not only in its fertilizer value but its organic matter and microbical activity

[Don_P]

These are composting aerobically. Is anyone successfully composting anaerobically and harvesting methane?

[rick91351]

Thanks paul s for weighing in on this matter.  It is certainly a subject I have seen skated around in several places and never properly addressed and it certainly needs to be.  It is a subject that has been studied and published by several organic societies.  All pretty much found the same-thing, human waste has no place in the garden.

As a huge fan of both organic seeds and gardening I would suggest turning not burning compost.   

Organic compost is one of the most valuable tools a family has toward building soil for their own sufficiency in gardening.  Please do not include any waste from pets nor human.  Also I would not suggest human waste in a compost pile even if used only on flower beds.  There is always the problem of cross contamination from tools and footwear plus skin contamination unless you want to wear an enviro suit while gardening.   

On the subject of ash actually you should / could use some wood ash in your garden and flower beds.  I know that is not what we are addressing here, and it is not this type of ash at all.


http://www.emmitsburg.net/gardens/articles/frederick/2004/ashes.htm
http://gardening.about.com/od/soil/f/Wood_Ash.htm

[MountainDon]

After we burn slash piles we rake out the ashes and can see improvement of grass growth. I braodcast spread the ashes from the wood stove.  Of course we have an acid soil to begin with.