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Map the estate's materials flow: what stays and what leaves

Draw a simple flow diagram of every material that enters the estate and where it ends up. Organics should loop back into soil; only clean recyclables, hazardous items and a small residual stream should leave.

How

1. List inputs: food, packaging, animal feed and bedding, building materials, fuel, batteries and electronics.
2. For each, mark its end point: compost, worm bin, biogas digester, animals, reuse, recycling run, hazardous drop-off or landfill.
3. Keep human excreta out of the kitchen and garden compost loop: that stream belongs to the sanitation module and has its own rules.
4. Show where manure from livestock goes (compost or digester) and where finished compost and digestate are used (food module).
5. Mark the locations on your site plan: kitchen collection point, compost bays, worm bin, digester (if any), dry recyclables store, hazardous locker, hauling route to the road.
6. Check that wet organics are close to the kitchen and garden and that hazardous storage is away from water sources.

Do these first

• site-1
• design-1

Sources

1. Sustainable Materials Management: Non-Hazardous Materials and Waste Management Hierarchy. US Environmental Protection Agency (archived snapshot), accessed 2026-11
2. Composting At Home. US Environmental Protection Agency, accessed 2026-11

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