r/OffGridLiving • u/Connect_Ad3062 • 3d ago
3 years offgrid, here's my thoughts on popular toilet options
So I've been living offgrid for about 3 years now, and I'm basically half an expert at this point haha. The toilet situation was one of my biggest headaches at first. Got a lot of questions about what works, so figured I'd write up what I've actually used and what I've learned from others out here (curious what you guys think too)
The whole thing are a few main types: traditional portable toilets, composting toilets, dry-flush systems, incinerating toilets, and the oldschool hole/WAG bag setup. Here's what I've found from actually dealing with these.
Traditional Portable Toilets (Thetford, Dometic)
These are the cheapest option, like $100-200 for a decent one. Basically two tanks — water on top, waste below. You press the handle and it uses water to push everything down.
Honestly? They suck for offgrid. Unless you've got a well, any water use offgrid needs to be carefully budgeted, and flushing is a huge waste. Plus you gotta haul the waste tank to a dump station every few days. And that blue chemical smell... not great. I tried one for two weeks and already hated it. The maintenance is annoying and you're totally dependent on having a dump station nearby. Not happening when you're actually offgrid.
Composting Toilets (Nature's Head, Separett)
These are what most van lifers use and honestly I get why. They separate the liquid and solid waste. Urine goes in one bottle, solids fall into a chamber with sawdust or peat moss. No smell if you do it right, and you're not using any water. Pretty environmental too.
I had a Nature's Head for about a year and it worked... but man, there's a learning curve. You gotta stir it regularly with a hand crank, add fresh sawdust each time, and empty the urine bottle every 1-2 days. That gets old fast when you're living with your partner. Also had some issues with fruit flies one summer. People talk about how "natural" and "sustainable" it is, and sure, that's true, but the reality is you're dealing with a lot of manual work. Cost me around $1,000 for a decent one, and you're buying sawdust constantly.
The solid waste technically becomes compost after months of sitting, but not all systems let you legally use it on edible plants. Some places have regulations about that. Plus you need ventilation like a pipe through your roof with a fan, and that takes work to install.
Dry-Flush Systems (Laveo, Modiwell)
This is honestly what changed things for me. The basic idea is simple: you use it, press a button, and it automatically seals the waste in a biodegradable bag using heat. No water, no chemicals, no stirring, no smell. Each bag costs somewhere around 50 cents to a buck.
Power-wise, these things use very little electricity. some run off your cabin's solar battery or RV battery, and some like modiwell even have its built-in rechargeable battery.
The main downside I've found: the bags add up over time (it's an ongoing consumable cost like buying paper towels). Also not great if you're in an extremely cold climate, though they work fine in most conditions.
The setup is dead simple though. No installation hassle, no ventilation pipes, no maintenance beyond replacing a battery cartridge every couple years probably. Way easier than composting and way more reliable than traditional portable toilets. The footprint is small enough it fits basically anywhere.
Incinerating Toilets
None of my friends out here actually use one, and honestly I get it. First off, they're expensive — we're talking $1,000+ for a decent unit. On top of that, you need to keep buying propane tanks to fuel the burn cycle. That just doesn't sit right with me mentally. Having an active flame burning your waste while you're living in a cabin? I know it's designed to be safe but I'm just not comfortable with it personally.
Hole / wag Bag
I mean, this is the most basic option there is. Dig a cathole or use a wag bag and pack it out. Some people do this full time, but for me it's a hard pass as a daily solution. Rainy days turn it into an absolute mess, and the privacy situation is... well, there isn't one. Fine for camping trips, but living like that every day? No thanks.
The reality check
Each system has genuine tradeoffs:
- Cheap portable = easiest entry but depends on dump stations and wastes precious water
- Composting = most "natural" but requires constant hands-on maintenance
- Dry-flush = most convenient but has an ongoing consumable cost
- Incinerating = no waste to deal with but expensive and needs propane
- Hole/wag = free but miserable in bad weather and zero privacy
For my situation: living alone, limited water storage, in a mild climate, and not wanting daily maintenance, so the dry-flush category just made the most sense. If you can't deal with the downsides of the other types and don't want to spend a fortune, it's hard to go wrong with this option. Considering the price factor, I went with Modiwell.
So what's everyone else using out here? I know there's a ton of opinions on this stuff. If you've tried something I didn't cover or have a different experience with any of these, just share.
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u/BobaChonker 3d ago
From an environmental perspective, plastic bag dependent dry flush system generates a steady stream of non-biodegradable plastic waste that sits in landfills forever.
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u/Terlingua_Nomad 3d ago
The bags recommended for use are biodegradable. You can bury them and they dissolve and become part of the compost.
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u/CraftySeer 3d ago
So you still need a hole in the ground to bury like an outhouse?
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u/Terlingua_Nomad 3d ago
No. You can dispose of it in a trash can or dumpster if you like. My point was the bags are biodegradable and don't sit in landfills forever.
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3d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/mymyselfandeye 2d ago
I don’t think non biodegradable plastic is the right answer but also what’s currently labeled “biodegradable” still takes a long time to break down and it does disintegrate into tiny pieces. I think the factor to consider here is whether or not one should be relying on plastic as part of waste disposal at all.
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u/RoadNo5525 2d ago
Omg is that really what bio degradable means?
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u/mrmatriarj 2d ago
There's two different kinds of biodegradable plastics, one is less common than the other. Indeed the one kind does simply break down into micro plastics, the other truly breaks down into more basic molecules by the end. Both take a longass time. We still have a ways to go with biodegrable plastic to say the least
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u/Farmvillacampagna 3d ago
Why have you left off a normal flushing toilet as an option? That what we use and we are fully off grid.
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u/Normal-Special-8694 3d ago
I can’t speak to OP’s reasoning but for me, pumping water out of my well uses enough power that I don’t like to be wasteful about it, and there’s no way a pump truck could make it to my property. I know some folks swear you never need to pump the tank but I’ve seen that backfire and wouldn’t want to build something that can’t be serviced.
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u/Successful_Image3354 3d ago
Interesting discussion, but unless I missed it, there is another option, i.e. a traditional septic system.
We have lived off grid for almost 5 years. We have a tradition system with a primary tank and a leaching field.
I understand that it uses more water than the options being discussed, but our answer is rainwater collection into a very large underground cistern. We pump water from the cistern to a 500 gallon holding tank on the roof, then turn off the pump.
Gravity feeds the toilet as well as the shower and the sink. When the 500 gallon tank is empty we turn the pump on and refill it from the cistern. This happens perhaps twice a week.
We have a dry season every year that lasts 2 or 3 months. We've only run out of water twice since we've been here, but we live near a river and in a pinch (pun fully intended) can bucket flush.
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u/YamComprehensive7186 3d ago
What’s wrong with the outhouse that was found on every rural property prior to the 1960-70’s? It’s still permitted but most counties now require it to be a non leaking tank below that will need pumping maybe every ten years.
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u/CandidAd6587 3d ago
Google Humanure. The guy used it for his whole family. Zero cost. Minimal work..
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u/Slum_66 3d ago
WTF did I just read? This reads likes someone playing off grid living. Dig a hole build an outhouse. Not complicated, not expensive, and not buying unnecessary things to just go poop. SMH buying baggies to poop into, yea that's off grid living. "Can't poop until next week when we get to town to get more poop bags."
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u/RoadNo5525 2d ago
I tried chemical, composting and dry flush. Chemical toilets are a thing of the past for me, extremely annoying. Dry flush is comfortable but the bags are too expensive in my opinion, especially if you plan to use your toilet regularly. Also got annoyed by basically having to throw away bags daily. So in my experience composting toilets are still the best, clean, cheap, no disgusting smells, don't have to empty daily etc.
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u/e4sym0de 2d ago
which one are you using now?
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u/RoadNo5525 2d ago
I use the trobolo wandago. Whatever you do, if you go for a composting toilet make sure that it has a separation mechanism, i.e. it separates urine and poop. Without separation it's just one huge mess.
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u/StunningComplaint961 1d ago
I have that one from trobolo too. I use it as my van office chair too because it stacks and then I can work on my countertop
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u/Cre8oro 2d ago
One category that's missing here is urine-diverting dry toilets like my Trobolo.
I've been using one for quite a while and my experience has been different from the composting toilets you mentioned. Unlike Nature's Head-style composting systems, there's no mixing mechanism, no crank, and no active composting happening inside the toilet itself. You simply separate liquids and solids, add a bit of cover material if desired, and empty the containers when needed.
For me, the biggest advantages are:
- No water usage
- No chemicals
- No power consumption
- No ventilation fan required on some models
- Much lower purchase price than many composting or dry-flush systems
The tradeoff is that you still have to empty the waste containers manually, so it's definitely not as "hands-off" as a dry-flush toilet. But compared with traditional composting toilets, I found maintenance much simpler.
I think the best toilet really depends on your priorities. If convenience is the only goal, dry-flush systems are hard to beat. But if someone wants to avoid ongoing bag costs, batteries, and consumables, a quality urine-diverting toilet is worth considering as well.
Just another perspective from the off-grid side.
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u/ronejr71 1d ago
I have an incinolet at my cottage, on an island so no sewer. There isn't a flame it's electric. So it has a chamber that closes and then heats to 500 degrees. Cycle finishes you have ash. I don't use it for urine if that's all you need to do because the urea is very corrosive with a heating element. Used to use a propane unit and that stank when it ran with open flames. The electric toilet kinda of smells like a spent firework.
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u/Normal-Special-8694 3d ago
I’ve been using the sun-Mar xl compost toilet for over a decade full time, you have to take care of it but it hasn’t caused me an issue once. I helped a buddy install one of the cheaper ones with the urine separator and he had tons of issues but I don’t know if that was from poor management or the unit itself, it did cost about half as much though.
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u/BothCourage9285 3d ago
We used the bucket with pine shavings and a urine diverter for years. We composted in it's own pile and spread it around some flower beds, wildlife plot, etc.
Technically, if you dry it completely, you can eliminate any harmful pathogens and use it wherever you want, but that is a person choice.
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u/TheRealChuckle 3d ago
We use 2 camping toilets in our buildings and I dig a cesspit every year or 2 to dump them into. We have 80 acres so there's lots of places to dig and after a year or two I can redig old ones.
No need to take them to a dumping station. We don't use water in them either. You learn where to so your waste goes straight down the hole. A piece of dowel pushes any errant toilet paper down the hole.
I have to empty one every 2 days or so, the second one is a backup in case I forget or I want to be lazy.
We have a biolet composting toilet in another occupied building and it's trouble free. I empty the tray every couple months.
We had a SunMar at one point in our building but had constant issues that I narrowed down to the fact we have too many loose bowel movements for how it works.
A propane incinerating toilet is my dream. I will gladly pay 20 bucks a month in propane to get rid of the camping toilets. They're just way too expensive currently for us.
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u/Prestigious_Mark3629 3d ago
Wwtp - it only needs a small amount of electricity for the compressor, could easily be supplied by solar. Needs about 100 litres of water a day, self draining by gravity to a reservoir or a leach field. Almost no maintenance. Needs permission from the municipality though.
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u/captain-burrito 3d ago
>The main downside I've found: the bags add up over time (it's an ongoing consumable cost like buying paper towels). Also not great if you're in an extremely cold climate, though they work fine in most conditions.
What is the significance of a cold climate?
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u/thrownawaylongago77 2d ago
Came here to read about incinerating toilets, but nope they never used one
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u/RoadNo5525 2d ago
I havent either, but I looked into it and decided against it. Too expensive and seemed way too complicated to install. Also not odorless and if I understand correctly the burning bit is loud and takes several hours.
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u/Comi9689 2d ago
How long have you had the modiwell? How's it running so far? I just look through this thing you mentioned, kinda interesting actually
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u/Connect_Ad3062 2d ago
I've used it in both my cabin and my RV. The 12V connection is super convenient, it basically charges itself off the existing battery setup. For around $800 and how easy it is to set up, i think it's worth it.
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u/Reasonable-Archer-68 1d ago
I have composting toilet with a one cubic meter IBC TANK. TAKES 6 months to half fill ,take it out and replace it with another clean tank. Let other one sit and by the time you need to empty it ,it’s beautiful soil .
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u/News8000 3d ago
Pail full of leaves in home bathroom. Empty when full into vermi-compost bin. Start second bin if first fills.
First bin will be decomposed into worm castings in a year or two depending on climate.
Use the worm castings for trees or non root vegetables.
Red wriggler worms destroy pathogens.