I’ve had some time to think about my experience at the US Composting Council conference in Austin, and have a lot of mixed feelings.
I will say outright that I am one of a few doing black soldier fly larvae (BSFL) composting. It’s a bit unconventional in the scope of what the conference was about.
On the day of the Emerging Composter Contest, I made sure to get to the Austin Convention Center at 8 am sharp to hang my poster for the contest. The only reason I knew how to find the contest area in the giant conference hall was the sheer luck of bumping into one of the contest organizers. She saw the telltale poster tube I was grasping with somewhat sweaty palms. A brief walk through giant windrow turners, screeners and displays, and six pushpins later, I had a poster up. It took longer to get my identification lanyard for the conference admittance.
During the 2-hour-long interview portion that was the Emerging Composter Contest, I got to speak to a lot of people about what I’m doing: in a region full of hills and valleys, a small-footprint, insect-driven solution felt more doable in a compost desert. But by the end of it, I was out of eloquence. I took a quick wine break back at the hotel before the closing celebration of the conference.
Anxious about the announcement of the winners, I impatiently listened to the first speaker as he explained how the US Composting Council conferences have grown over the years, from a dozen and a half attendees to a trade show hall filled with big equipment! This moment sticks out the most for me. It has haunted me and bothered me and annoyed me. It’s not the not winning a prize part — it’s the vast detachment of what I’m trying to accomplish and what this industry is pushing: giant, fossil fuel burning, six-figure costing equipment that will require expensive maintenance and repairs to manage a huge operation. I’m sorry but I thought we were trying to sequester carbon and reduce greenhouse gases.
These giant-scale solutions don’t work for the majority of communities. Who has it in their budget for such an operation to devote swaths of land to decomposing material? A smaller, circular economy provides more than resources but also community development. I’ve struggled so much with these Wal-Mart-scale solutions that don’t look at what a small community needs or has to offer.
I firmly believe that these giant pieces of equipment are just big toys. These are mechanical statues to our selfishness and egotism. Composting is a biological process that requires equipment to manage stages and products, but it is meant to create resources, not a need for new resources. We are smarter than this. I expect more and better, and we should be demanding such. It is 2022.
This all may be coming across as me shitting on the US Compost Council, but I wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t say that I was completely disappointed by what I saw and heard. I didn’t feel hopeful. I felt like I’m yet again in a situation where I have to grind the gears in a different direction. We should focus on building communities with businesses supporting them, and not vice versa. I saw the opposite there. If people thrive in health and wellness, everything else should follow suit.
[Steps down from soap box]
I will say outright that I am one of a few doing black soldier fly larvae (BSFL) composting. It’s a bit unconventional in the scope of what the conference was about.
 |
| My poster design for the contest |
During the 2-hour-long interview portion that was the Emerging Composter Contest, I got to speak to a lot of people about what I’m doing: in a region full of hills and valleys, a small-footprint, insect-driven solution felt more doable in a compost desert. But by the end of it, I was out of eloquence. I took a quick wine break back at the hotel before the closing celebration of the conference.
Anxious about the announcement of the winners, I impatiently listened to the first speaker as he explained how the US Composting Council conferences have grown over the years, from a dozen and a half attendees to a trade show hall filled with big equipment! This moment sticks out the most for me. It has haunted me and bothered me and annoyed me. It’s not the not winning a prize part — it’s the vast detachment of what I’m trying to accomplish and what this industry is pushing: giant, fossil fuel burning, six-figure costing equipment that will require expensive maintenance and repairs to manage a huge operation. I’m sorry but I thought we were trying to sequester carbon and reduce greenhouse gases.
These giant-scale solutions don’t work for the majority of communities. Who has it in their budget for such an operation to devote swaths of land to decomposing material? A smaller, circular economy provides more than resources but also community development. I’ve struggled so much with these Wal-Mart-scale solutions that don’t look at what a small community needs or has to offer.
 |
| Windrow turner |
I firmly believe that these giant pieces of equipment are just big toys. These are mechanical statues to our selfishness and egotism. Composting is a biological process that requires equipment to manage stages and products, but it is meant to create resources, not a need for new resources. We are smarter than this. I expect more and better, and we should be demanding such. It is 2022.
This all may be coming across as me shitting on the US Compost Council, but I wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t say that I was completely disappointed by what I saw and heard. I didn’t feel hopeful. I felt like I’m yet again in a situation where I have to grind the gears in a different direction. We should focus on building communities with businesses supporting them, and not vice versa. I saw the opposite there. If people thrive in health and wellness, everything else should follow suit.
[Steps down from soap box]
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