There have been countless incredible inventions in 2019 alone, from flying cars to brain implants. Innovative and advanced technologies are being developed every day in practically every area.
So what about composting? Compost is something that has been around for literally millennia - surely we’ve come up with some pretty cool compost tech … right?
Well, that a big sort-of. There has been a few cool things coming out but there’s still a long way to get into the leagues of what other industries, such as healthcare and energy, are creating.
To be fair, there are definitely some really innovative and advanced technologies out there but they’re almost entirely designed for and used in commercial composting, which we haven’t really talked much about on here.
Basically commercial composting is really similar to composting in your backyard. Except, of course, it’s a thousand times bigger, faster and hotter. There are also plenty of ways to do it, each of which has some pretty cool tech.
The accuracy of commercial monitoring probes, for example, is completely off-the-charts and they do look pretty slick. These devices are able to test for temperature, moisture, pH, C02, methane, oxygen and a whole lot of other things in the extremely toxic conditions of compost.
These probes are cool but you’ve still got to do all the testing yourself. Where the high-end commercial compost innovation is happening are in what’s called in-vessel systems.
These systems are enclosed, typically stainless-steel containers that shred up and heat your organic waste. The benefits of them is that you have to do literally nothing - no turning, no watering, absolutely nothing. You chuck your organic waste in and get high-quality organic fertiliser out, sometimes in as little as a few days!
While in-vessel systems are super advanced they’re definitely priced to match. Just one of them could put you back $20,000. That’s also just the purchase cost, not even considering the ongoing power costs to run. You better be hungry too because even the smallest usually need at least 100kgs of organic waste a day to be cost-effective.
Because of this, all of these technologies are really only appropriate at all for large-scale composting, leaving home and community composters basically nothing. You can buy pretty cheap compost temperature probes but in terms of innovative, exciting, affordable technology for small-scale composters, you’re out of luck.
To be fair, there are some super futuristic domestic composting units that can grind, process and mature organic waste in only a few days on your kitchen bench. Notice how we said affordable though? One of these kits may set you back by at least $500, making them prohibitively expensive for a majority of households.
This why what we’re developing here at EarthOffset is so important. The significance of technology to enable mass adoption of composting cannot be understated but to date there just aren't any affordable, small-scale solutions. Our monitoring system will make composting as easy as an in-vessel system at the price point of the home compost thermometer.
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