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Can you Compost Indoors with a Bin or Tumbler?

Depending on where you live, composting in the winter can be a real drag. Every winter I receive emails asking if it's possible to compost indoors. The answer is pretty simple- If composting with worms, yes.  If you want to keep a compost tumbler or compost bin in your basement or the garage...no. Well, I guess you can do what you want really, depending on your tolerance for other forms of life sharing your space.  Remember that compost piles are ecosystems full of life. Materials break down year round...decomposition slows in the winter, but not enough to warrant bringing a composting system indoors. Here's the factors that come into play when trying to compost in the basement/indoors: 1) Mice.  Compost piles are nice, warm places to live...this can invite mice. …

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Failure of the Wilmington Compost Facility Underscores Need for a Locally Based and Diverse Composting Infrastructure (article by Neil Seldman)

The content that follows was written by Neil Seldman and originally published on the Institute for Local Self-Reliance website at http://ilsr.org/failure-wilmington-compost-facility-underscores-locally-based-diverse-composting-infrastructure/ Go directly to the link above to check it out.  I'm reposting simply because hopefully more people will read it that way and it's an important topic to discuss if we're to move in the right direction with one of our biggest waste issues. The rapid increase in community-scale composting in the Mid-Atlantic is sorely needed. The recent closing of the Wilmington Organics Recycling Center in Delaware, due to the loss of its operating permit, has pushed the need for a distributed and diverse composting infrastructure to the fore. Source separated food discard programs from New York City to Washington, DC, are now scrambling to find alternative sites to…

Continue ReadingFailure of the Wilmington Compost Facility Underscores Need for a Locally Based and Diverse Composting Infrastructure (article by Neil Seldman)