Cohousing-L Mailing List: compost

[Jude Foster (foster.jude]

To change to a more earthy subject, I’d like to open a discussion of compost.  
Beautiful, sustainable, essential compost.  

My community is committed to a re-design of our compost system in 2015, and our 
ad hoc group is interested in hearing from coho's who have mastered this 
ongoing challenge of sustainability, sharing knowledge and experience.
Trillium Hollow is a suburban community of 29 households, and this means we 
have lots of kitchen scraps.  We have 3 1/2 acres, with gardens and natural 
forest and greenspace, but no chickens or other animals, not an ecovillage.  We 
have a 3-bin system now, which makes good compost, but which is open at the 
top, not quite big enough, and in the wrong place.  So we want to make it 
better.  Especially, no more nice, warm nesting and feeding for rats!  

We have four goals for this re-design:
rat-proof, largely odor-free, aesthetic, and efficient and effective for 
residents.

We are considering wood versus concrete, slab vs open earth, roofed with a 
connected open structure for storage, etc etc.  Obviously, there are lots of 
designs online, but our shared lives and abundance of kitchen scraps pose 
unique challenges.

If you would like to engage in an exchange of photos, ideas, information, and 
inspiration - please reply.

Yours for the green and growing earth,
Jude, lead compost person at Trillium Hollow Cohousing in Portland, Oregon.