On Wed, 14 Jan 2004 15:05:44 +0000, Stephen M. Henning wrote:



Be careful about what you read. Composting will never remove heavy
metals which are present in the color sections of newspapers and most
organic waste from the top of the food chain. They are toxic and are
never removed by composting. Composting never removes elemental toxins,
it can just convert molecular toxins. Also, don't be mislead about the
high temperatures of composting. Even incinerators don't break down all
toxic waste into harmless substances. That is why so many people are
objecting to having waste incinerators in their neighborhoods.

I AM careful about what I read. And that's why I'd like you to define what
you mean by "organic waste from the top of the food chain". If you are
referencing human waste (as it seems you might be), then I think you are
fully mistaken.

Even if there are heavy metals in the ink (a point still open to
contention), there is darned little ink on a page and only a TINY fraction
of that would be the actual offending metal. Moreover, composting does
bind up elemental toxins into safer compounds ... they, after all, are the
building block of 'molecular' toxins.

I have a great deal of confidence in the effectiveness of the microbiology
of a compost pile. While I would not lace it with strychnine and then dine
on it directly, that's because I don't deliberately eat compost directly
under any circumstances. I would be completely willing to dose a fresh
pile, compost it as per my usual custom and then use it in my garden after
a 2 year aging period.

Bill