Mr. Compost: How to make an in-kitchen compost turbocharger!

Mr. Compost is an appliance which heats and agitates food scraps collected in your kitchen. This accelerates decomposition before you put the compost outside (in a worm bin or compost pile) to finish breaking down.

My own goal was to build something that would break things down enough that once transferred to my worm bin, the compost won't draw flies. This will allow me to move the worms inside during the winter without an entourage of flying insects.

Agitation helps add oxygen to the mix and mechanically break things down while allowing moisture to escape, and high temperatures (we'll be shooting for 140F) are ideal for the voracious thermophilic bacteria which take over naturally when outdoor compost piles build up enough internal heat on their own. As a bonus, flies stay away from things at that temperature.

Doesn't this waste energy? It does use some electricity, but if you're a city dweller who can use this and a worm bin instead of curbside yard waste collection, then disposing of kitchen scraps this way saves energy! I'm still working on getting 1.21 gigawatts back out of it though....

Sound complicated? We're just replacing the computerized controller in another appliance that holds, heats, and agitates things: a bread maker!

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