Composting Toilets are a WASTE of TIME?

Today we're doing something a little different. I've had what you would call a hot take rolling around in my brain for the last couple of months. Composting toilets are a waste of time for your house. Yep, I just said it. It felt so good to say it out loud. Now, don't be mad. Just give me a second. I'm no stranger to composting toilets. Our family of six installed one in our renovated vintage Airstream all the way back in 2017. We used it full-time throughout our travels and even made a fun video sharing our experience with them. Then we hauled our Airstream to our off-grid desert homestead in 2020 and continued to use it while we designed and built an entire composting building with multiple barrels and urine diversion. I mean, we were all in on the idea of composting toilets. Now, unfortunately, that experiment failed, which is a story for another day, but it's not why I think composting toilets are a waste of time. I know that composting can work. I know it has its benefits, but the reality is it becomes a huge time sink. And I should know. I spent the last eight years shoveling my family's stuff. I fought the good fight. I scooped the gross poo. I turned it. I cleaned it. I maintained it. And you know what? I got over it. It was gross. Not necessarily when you're using it, but if you are the one who gets to clean it and maintain it, you have officially committed to handling your own feces, but for the of your life. Just let that sink in. I came to this realization when we gutted that building and installed our first flushing toilet. After eight years of composting, it was a revelation. But it did require a septic system and a lot more expense. There are, of course, pros and cons to composting and septic systems. So maybe before we go much further, let's look at the basics of how these work. Composting toilets work by separating your liquids and your solids or your poo and your pee into different containers. Our nature's head toilet sends the liquid to a bucket that you can remove and sprinkle on the ground. For the solids, you'll have to prep and add a medium. This can be something like coconut core or sawdust, and it either stays in the hopper and gets agitated each time you go or you have to dump fresh material on top of your waste every time that you go. It's important to mention that composting takes a long time. You can't just poop in a bucket and go dump it on your plants. It needs months or even years of maintenance, turning the material, keeping it at the right moisture content, and sizing the whole system to have the runway to fill up one bucket and let it have time to compost while you fill up another bucket and work out that cycle so that you're not out of toilets when you need them. You may even end up with a secondary location that you put the material into and then you have to also turn that and maintain it to make sure that it's composting properly. Either way, keeping up with this maintenance can get really time-consuming, especially if more than one or two people are using the system. Septic systems are usually installed in remote areas where you don't have access to a city sewage system. This gives you a place to send all of your water from your sinks, showers, and toilets into a buried waterproof tank that is large enough for the solids to settle at the remaining liquid exits the tank into the leach or drain field, which uses the soil as a natural filter to remove harmful bacteria. Anything that doesn't break down in the septic tank gets pumped every few years. There are a lot of rules and regulations and permits all centered around septic systems, and it's for a good reason. If they're not installed properly, you run the risk of injecting harmful elements into your soil or overloading the ground and causing backups or tainted areas on your property. But on the flip side of that, if they are sized and installed correctly, they're actually a really environmentally friendly way of taking all of your wastewater, using the soil to filter it, and put it back into the aquifer. Okay, with that out of the way, we have talked to so many people who are moving out to raw land kind of like us, and when they see the cost of a septic system, they immediately start looking at alternatives, which, I guess, septics can be really expensive. Starting with a composting toilet saves a ton of money up front. But where I think people are really going wrong is they are expecting the process of composting their own waste to be a long-term and sustainable endeavor. Don't be wrong, saving a bunch of money on installing a smaller septic system can be a real motivator. It's easily going to get you through the first year of composting, maybe even two years. But by this point, it's too late. They've already started construction on their home without plumbing for a flushing toilet, they've permitted a septic that's too small, and even just the thought of replumbing and having to resize the septic to put in a flushing toilet seems completely out of reach. So, they move forward, they finish the house, and then at some point, they have the same realization that I did, that they have committed to dealing with this composting thing indefinitely. Now, that may be a trade-off that you are willing to make, and if so, more power to you. Like we said, composting systems work a lot better for like one or two people. It's when you start bringing in partners who aren't familiar with the system or guests where things really start to break down. And I don't mean in a composting way. All right, let's get real. Let's talk about stuff we don't usually talk about. Number one, the not fully on board partner. Oftentimes in this scenario, there is one person that's pushing the composting toilet agenda. The other one is going along with it, trying to be supportive. This won't manifest itself until a few years in, but eventually, it will come to a head and you're going to be stuck with the decisions you made early on, and you're not going to be able to change it. Save your marriage, get a flushing toilet. Number two, diarrhea. I did choose number two for a reason. Listen, if you get sick or if you eat a heavy plant-based diet and your stools are what we will call less than solid, you start to have an issue because composting requires a certain amount of moisture in the solids mix, but not too much. And so if there's too much, you're either adding way more material than you thought you would, or you're having to maintain and clean way more often than you should have to. Same goes for vomit. If you need to throw up and you don't have anywhere else to do that, and you do it inside your solids bin, you're going to have to deal with that. And it is super gross. Super, super gross. Number three, speaking of super gross, guests. Let me tell you, if we have people come over and they needed to go to the bathroom, we would take them in there and show them the whole process. We'll be like, you do this and this, and every single time, disaster. I cannot even begin to explain to you all the ways that it went wrong. And there's nothing worse than cleaning up your friend's bathroom mess. I'm still a little bit scarred. If you've ever worked at a business where you had to clean a public restroom, just multiply the grossness times 10. Friends don't let friends use composting toilets. Might be the title of this video. Okay, I've dunked on composting toilets a lot, but let's talk about when they do make sense to use. First of all, mobile applications like RVs or boats. Having a composting toilet in our Airstream allowed us to camp in beautiful, remote areas without needing to haul the RV out to find a dump. It also kept our water uses low, meaning we didn't need to refill our fresh tank very often. If you need a way to go to the bathroom on a remote area of your property and you're not going to use it every day, a composting system works great. Also, places where you can't get water in, you're worried about water usage, composting toilets basically don't use any water. So that is definitely a consideration. And I also understand that there are some areas where a septic system just isn't viable. The terrain can be too rocky or the soil can be too clay heavy for infiltration. The cost of permits and inspections can quickly get out of control. In these cases, a composting toilet system may be your only option. If you're just a solo dude or dudette who doesn't mind shoveling their own stuff and is willing to commit to the long-term maintenance, it is totally doable. But if you're creating a home you're going to share with other people and you want to enjoy that time and not be burdened with the never-ending process of cleaning and maintaining a composting system, my hot take thesis still stands. It may take a few years, but eventually you're going to wish you had put in a bigger septic system and the proper plumbing for a flushing toilet. And look, if you can't afford that right now, maybe just file this in the back of your brain as you're designing and building your home to build in an option to add that flushing toilet later. Future you will thank you. That is all. Thank you for coming to my composting rant. I will see you next time.