Food Cycler Brings Composting to Your Countertop

One of the things I will always remember from my childhood was the huge compost bin in the corner of our garden. And when I say huge, I mean it. It was about eight feet by four feet, and about four feet deep. The best part was going out after dinner and tossing in fruit rinds, vegetable peelings, and all manner of food scraps (but not meat; never ever meat…it draws predators). That’s a much larger scale than most people want to compost for the most part, and for those who live in urban settings even a small compost bin is not something that will work for you. But you might have a small vegetable garden, whether planted in the ground or in containers. And those vegetables need fertilizer to grow to their full potential.

Compost is a fabulous way to not only fertilize your tomatoes, but to reduce your overall carbon footprint. Even if you never use it as fertilizer, composting will reduce your impact on landfills dramatically. Here’s the thing: Organic matter discarded as trash comes to about 30 million tons every year, and when it sits in a landfill it produces methane gas. Currently, less than 3% of that waste gets recycled. But your options are limited, because compost smells exactly like what it is: rotting plant and vegetable matter. Who wants that in their house?

The Food Cycler: Home is an Indiegogo project looking for funding, specifically designed for those of you who don’t have an outdoor location for compost, but who still would like to do it. It measures about one cubic foot, so you don’t need a lot of room, and plugs right into a regular wall outlet. All you do is deposit your scraps in the compost chamber, close the lid, and hit the go button. Food Cycler turns the organic waste from your household (about 1/6 of waste in the average household) into compost using a combination of heat and agitation that can be used as a “soil amendment and accelerant” (read: fertilizer). There’s nothing else required to make it work, and it doesn’t need to be drained or vented. It even has a filter so there is no odor, and its motor is very quiet.

It’s not cheap. While you can pledge as little as $5.00 CAD, if you want one you’re going to have to shell out at least $399.00 CAD. However, estimated retail cost is supposed to be around $499.00 CAD, so it’s a pretty good deal. The funding campaign runs through March 26.

Source: Digital Trends