Conservation, environment, water and wildlife
A warm home from compost
Green Ideas editorial team
Most people know that compost produces heat, but it took a team of innovative Japanese students to realise this could translate to an electricity-free form of warmth for homes.
Nobody wants rotting compost inside, so the students got around the problem by using sealed transparent boxes in the walls which fermented hay using the low-odour bokashi system.
Their test house was in a rural area where grass was readily available; it was first dried on the exterior of the home, where it provided insulation, then transferred into the internal boxes to provide up to 30°C all through winter.