Well, the great Pela Lomi composter experiment has come to an end.
If you’re new here, I’m big on sustainability.
At least, as big as someone living in a modern capitalist U.S. society can be, within reason.
I’m also (unfortunately) a longterm apartment dweller since home prices in Flagstaff are pretty out of reach for me and Ryan right now.
So, when I first heard about the Pela Lomi home composter years and years ago, it was an easy purchase.
Until it wasn’t.
I’ll spare you a repeat story, but after a little more than three years with our Lomi, we finally called it quits.
You can read the whole story here.
RELATED POST:
One year later… our Pela Lomi composter
My Pela Lomi review is one of my most-read posts oddly enough, and I get a lot of comments/ contact form entries/ emails asking for more information.
To make a long story short, Ryan and I got tired of filing warranty claims every other month. After multiple bucket replacements, fan replacements and three (!!!) entire unit replacements, our warranty coverage (we paid for the extended warranty) ran out, and we decided to pile our two broken Lomi units into the back of my Jeep to drop off as part of Flagstaff’s large electronics recycling program.
To give Pela the benefit of the doubt, Ryan and I did purchase our Lomi pretty early on, light, right after it launched on Kickstarter. Pela has released several new Lomi models since we ordered the original, so maybe one of the newer models is a touch more reliable?
I think this review Ryan found online (which made us both laugh out loud) sums it up best: “This products works perfectly for the exact duration of the warranty and not a day longer.”
Ryan and I went back to our Compost Crowd subscription for a bit before we decided to order a tumbling composter and give that a try.
Ryan did the research, and picked out this 43-gallon dual-chamber tumbling bin from THEGROW’ING.
After it arrived last week, Ryan assembled it during one of his breaks between fire assignments and set it up in a shady spot in our side yard.
I will acknowledge, we are lucky enough that our apartment has a teeny tiny side yard, so a tumbling composter definitely wouldn’t be feasible for a renter without the luxury of a yard or even a small balcony.
We’ve only had it for about a week now, but we’ve already been busy filling it up with fruit and vegetable scraps, cardboard shreds, eggshells, coffee grounds, houseplant cuttings and other compostable materials.
Plus, fun fact Flagstaff friends! The City of Flagstaff Sustainability Office actually offers a rebate program for your composter! Submit your receipt and you can get $75 of your purchase price back.
We submitted our rebate form a few days after we bought our composting bin.
There are definitely some changes that we have to adhere to with our new composting method. We have to be diligent about balancing our “browns” and “greens,” and about actively monitoring our compost since we won’t just dump a mix of stuff into a device and hit an “on” button.
Wondering what you can and can’t compost? The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has a great guide.
I’m a little bummed that we no longer have the ability to compost bioplastics, leftovers, small seafood shells/bones/skins/etc., but it seems like a fair tradeoff to have something that (hopefully) doesn’t break every eight weeks.
And, while I didn’t start a garden this year due to reasons (see: wedding planning, fire season, etc.) I’m hoping that life will be a bit more conducive to gardening come next summer so that I’ll have a chance to use the compost we generate.
