THE COMPOST – A METHOD TO RESTORE THE ORGANIC WASTE PRODUCTS IN THE NATURAL CIRCUIT

Abstract

Half of the quantity of waste products produced by the households is made of food
remainders, vegetable and garden remainders and more of 50% of waste products are organic
and they arrive in waste products storehouses, in cesspools or are burned, causing an
important pollution. As an alternative to those, we can transform the organic material through
a set of microbial, biochemical, chemical and physical processes into a valuable material with
a humus appearance, named compost. To obtain a quality compost we need to lead the
compost process, in accordance with the dimension, the humidity, the structure and the
composition of residual materials, that these to be fast and efficient available to the microorganisms,
making up an ideal substratum rich in nutrients for their development. The
decomposition agents (bacterium, fungous, mites, Collembola, wooden lice, worms,
diplopoda) need the azote to build the cells and some food remainders, ripped grass and green
leaves. The chips of wood, the dry leaves and the sawdust are rich in carbon and they
constitute another energy source for the decomposition agents. The azote sources are
designated as the „green” elements, and the carbon sources are the „brown” ones. In a pile of
compost is efficient to maintain a balance between the „brown” elements (carbon) and the
„green” ones (azote) – in percent of 30:1 to offer the decomposition agents a balanced
nourishment and this thing can be acquired through the alternation of layers of brown and
green elements. The production of compost in schools can be a way to determine the entire
school community to work together for helping the environment. This means the natural
recirculation of resources, community education over the benefits of the compost, the change
of the cultural attitude over the garbage in a way that brings benefits to the society, the
reduction of the alimentary remainders quantity from the school canteen, the implication of
the students in extra- curricular activities, and, not finally, the acquirement of a fertile soil for
school garden, for planting flowers and seedlings. The using of the compost as a fertilizer
contributes to: the improvement of the soil structure and his resistance to erosion, the supply
with nutritive elements necessary for the plants growth (because the deliver of the nutritive
substances inside the soil is made gradually, the compost permanently supplies fertilizers to
the soil), the development of the soil fauna (especially the dew worms that contribute to
aeration), the diminution of the negative effects of toxic agents like pesticides or heavy metal
because of the disuse of any chemical fertilizers, the increase of the soil capacity to retain
water, the removing of some pathogenic factors from the soil, the soften of the quite clayey
soils, the solving of the climate changes problem, because the compost retains the carbon
dioxide at the ground level.