Nature’s Head Composting Toilet

Nature's Head composting toilet

The Nature’s Head composting toilet uses peat moss to break down solid wastes.

The toilet has two sections, with an automatic diverter between them. The compartment in the front holds urine, and the bin in the back holds solids and the composting peat moss.

You have to empty the urine compartment once every couple of days, while the solids bin doesn’t have to be emptied for up to six months! With this composting toilet, you’ll be able to boondock to your heart’s content.

The toilet ships from Ohio, USA. Shipping to Canada is available.

This man uses his Nature’s Head toilet in his tiny house on wheels.

natures Head composting toilet for tiny homes

Original video by Art Cormier

Transcript:

Composting toilets come in two basic designs.

One can be as simple as a container filled with some type of medium, usually sawdust, and the liquids and solids go into that container.

You mix it, add more material as you need. Those tend to be, you have to empty them regularly. Otherwise the smell can become an issue in a small space.

Moving up, the other type basically has a mechanism to separate the liquids from the solids. In that case, you empty the liquids quite regularly, but the solids are best left alone. They actually decompose without the moisture from the urine at a very rapid rate, and it’s quite convenient.

This particular model is made by Nature’s Head. And it is a separating type. It has two separate containers. One for liquids, and a composting bin for the solids.

It requires no water supply so that simplifies the installation. And it requires no sewage connection, and that greatly simplifies the maintenance and installation.

The only connection required for this unit is a small vent hose that drafts the air to the outside and 12 or 24 V power supply for the fan.

Let’s take a closer look at this model.

This model is the Nature’s Head. It was originally designed for the boating industry. It’s very sturdy, relatively lightweight. This is the entire unit, with the compost.

It has a standard type lid, the seat is fixed and the inside is designed so that there’s a bit of a diverter. The liquids are funneled to the hole in the front, and when you want to put the solids in, there’s a trap door. Just like an airplane toilet.

The liquids are collected in this bin in the front. And that’s something you probably want to empty on a every other day basis. To empty it is quite simple. There’s two latches on the side. The seat lifts up. It’s normally attached to the ground, and the liquid bin comes out. It’s great fertilizer for your yard.

Now, the composting bin is directly under the seat. You start it with peat moss. Hydrated peat moss. And this unit has actually been in service now for I’m almost embarrassed to say, almost eight months.

The manufacturer says it’s good for about 90 uses before you need to replace it. And this has been a surprise for me. The toilet has been, other than emptying the urinal, it is maintenance free, and it is virtually odor free.

Everything decomposes right here in the bin. There’s an agitator right here that mixes it up, and at the end of your…when you’re ready to replace it, this whole section comes off, and you just have the bin to take out and dump.

So, very simple system, trouble free, and very convenient. The advantage again to a composting toilet system, the first is you don’t create sewage. It’s quite energy inefficient to use our drinking water to flush our solids, our wastes away.

It simplifies the installation and it greatly simplifies and sanitizes what you have to deal with. If you’re talking about living in a tiny house with a black water tank under the unit that you have to haul somewhere and empty, that is far more undesirable than emptying this recycle bin once every six months.

So, we’re going to empty it and place fresh media in it, and we’ll show you how that goes.

We’re going to do a little test here. Since they haven’t come out with smell-o-vision yet, most people don’t believe me when I tell them that the composting toilet doesn’t have any odor.

So what I’ve got on the table is a bin of fresh hydrated peat moss, which is how you start off the composting bin. And I have the actual composting toilet that’s been in use now for over six months.

And I have a willing participant here, Justin, and he’s going to actually do a blindfolded smell test for us. We’ll see how this goes.

So Justin, I’m going to lead you up here so you don’t get too close. I just want you to lean over slightly and tell me what you smell.

[leaning over used toilet]

Smells sort of like soil.

[leaning over fresh peat moss]

Slightly more like soil.

OK, so one smells like soil, the second one smells slightly more like soil. OK you can take your blindfold off.

Any odor or anything other than soil?

No, certainly didn’t smell like poo.

[laughing]

OK, well thank you Justin.

You’re welcome.

We’ll get you that beer.

There may be small errors in this transcript.

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