Culhane puts finishing touches on a basement biodigester at the home of the Rockefeller/Lindstrom family at Mud Creek Farm
June 15, 2014
Joseph Grimaldi, Christopher Lindstrom, and T.H. Culhane finished the second Solar CITIES basement biodigester in the cellar of Chris’ mother’s restoration house on the Mud Creek Farm near Hudson, NY. Chris’ mom, Abby Rockefeller, has been a champion of composting toilets for four decades. Abby was the person who brought the first Clivus Multrum systems to the US and made a campaign against septic systems and sewers. She was ahead of her time, arguing that natural microbial processes were the best way to turn human wastes into assets to return fertility to the earth and build soil health.
The Rockefeller/Lindstrom family has been active in compost latrines outside of the US too, running a project in Jamaica, for example. They have been curious about the application of home and community-scale biodigestion for development. With this basement build, which accompanies a basement composting Clivus Multrum, they are now exploring the synergies between anaerobic and aerobic microbial processes for all household waste in an integrated suite of solutions.