Vera Carrera

Hello there, it is so cool that people actually do this "center based" conpisting. I wasn't sure if this is an odd idea but apparently it makes sense for certain applications.

Timothy Norton wrote:I did some digging because I swore I saw a heat graph of a compost pile before and luckily I found it again. (Source)

While I do not fully understand the context, it appears the temperature drops off quickly once it doe start dropping towards the edges.

When looking at the graph one can see that the outermost 10°C contour line is about 1 m away from the 60°C contour line. So at 1 m height  you'd  need to get 1 m into the pile from all sides to reach the 60°C core.

So thanks this graph provides some notion about heat distribution within the pile.

Hello!

For a long-term project I intend to build aerated compost piles.  Since I need an efficient way to get pasteurized compost
I would like to know what the heat distribution within a compost pile looks like.

Maybe you know from experience
For example, if I have a cylindrical pile 4 ft in diameter and 4 ft tall. Imagine the pile reaches 70°C (140°F) in the center.

Can you estimate at what distance from the ambient environment there is still a temp of 60°C? for instance, if the ambience has 20°C .

I  would like to make a cylindrical bucket made out of mesh within the cylindrical pile (which is held together by a mesh too) which I could just lift like a
bag so I get only the pasteurized part.

Thanks for an answer!