Activators are designed to speed up the compost process by providing sugar or nitrogen to trigger rapid microbial growth. Normally an activator is not needed. If your mixture of materials to be composted has a C:N ratio higher than about 30:1, however, then addition of nitrogen will speed up the composting process.

this is all i could find on it, i thought it would be a carbon, but i guess not. does this help any?
i got it from this website it is about frequently asked questions. its the second paragraph down. :'))

Here is a link that might be useful: sugar is a brown

If I remember my high school science correctly, glucose (a really simple sugar) has the chemical formula C6H12O6. Sucrose (table sugar) is C12H22O11.

Other sugars have similar formulas, but those are the only two I remember (high school was a long time ago, so I don't know why I remember those).

So, basically, sugars are all essentially carbon bonded with water (notice that the H is always 2x the O in those formulas?). N=green, C=brown. Sugar has no N at all, so it's a brown.

That's why some people recommend using it to try to rehabilitate dog urine spots--the carbon in the sugar quickly counteracts the nitrogen in the urine.

It is a fast food source, in a way. Sawdust is almost pure cellulose (C6H10O5). And I just remembered why I remember these three formulas.

Despite the similarity in chemical formulas, the carbon in cellulose is not as readily available as the carbon in sugar. It's not something we can digest at all. In food, cellulose is known as fiber (at one time, there were foods being sold with the ingredient "non food fiber" listed, until people figured out that it meant sawdust).

So it's a "fast food" of sorts, but it's a definite brown.

Since sodas are empty calories, no food value, why would someone consume them much less add them to the compost? Sugars are carbon, and a carbon source with no value.

I don't think people drink coffee, tea and beer for their food value, either.

Water sipping only for Kimmsr, remind me never to go to his house for a party.

Carbon is carbon. I don't suppose the microherd cares much about phytonutrients and anti-oxidants?

Yes, sugar is a brown. No nitrogen in sugar; just carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. And better that the pop (=soda in other parts of the country), if you drink it anyway, should go on the compost than down the drain.

I'm a "recovering" Diet Coke addict - so I drink it & add it to my compost pile "just for the taste of it" ;)

Wow! I love the science recall bpgreen! And thanks to ALL for responding & helping me out.

All the Best, Tree

I'm not sure whether the sweeteners in diet drinks are digestible by the microbes or not. You may be adding little more than water, but there's no harm in that.

Dear kimmsr,

Now that I know others are putting their "flat" and possibly warm soda into compost piles, I'm going to do it, too. Every now and then I just don't want to finish a ginger ale/root beer/whatever and I've been dumping them (yikes!) down the drain.

No more. Now I'm gonna feed those microbes. I can't use diet drinks (aspartame is a migraine trigger for a lot of us), so those microbes will be getting silly on either sugar or high-fructose corn syrup.

Cynthia

"I don't think people drink coffee, tea and beer for their food value, either."

Actually coffee has a lot of health benefits, according to Dr. Oz anyway. ;) That's what I tell myself over my cup of joe every morning. And noon. And lot of nights for that matter.

And people all over the world drink various kinds of tea for health benefits. Whether there is any truth to it or not, remember the whole green tea prevents cancer trend? Not to mention all the medicinal herbs that people put in tea.

Beer, I'll give your that one.

I think I'd be in the camp of cringing at the thought of all the chemically processed stuff in soda in my compost. I'm definately not versed on the science behind it though. But most U.S. sodas (or cokes to southerners) are sweetened with corn syrup, not acutal sugar. Does that make a difference at all? Corn syrup is so processed our bodies can barely digest it. And artificial sweeteners in compost. Ew. Oh my, I think I'll stop before I get a reputation for being squimish about my compost...

Catankgirl--I remember visiting a friend in the south and ordering a Coke. I was prepped so I wasn't surprised to be asked what kind of coke I wanted. I asked for a 7Up. The waitress suggested tame and said it was kandalak senup. I was puzzled until my friend told me it was kind of like 7up. So I ordered it. If she hadn't brought the bottle to the table, I would have never known that tame (kandalaksenup) is Teem (kind of like 7up).

I may be wrong, but I think corn sweeteners are closer to glucose than to sucrose. Glucose is a simpler sugar than sucrose, so it would be digested faster.

"Corn syrup is so processed our bodies can barely digest it."

Do you have any links to support this? It seems to be the exact opposite of my understanding. My understanding is that corn syrup has lots of very simple sugars so it is digested readily (if anything, too readily).

Don't worry about getting a reputation for being squeamish about compost. One of our most esteemed members is so revolted by the idea of bread in compost that she is only able to type with one hand (the other being otherwise engaged in the nausea fighting game) when the subject is mentioned.

bpgreen, thanks for the response. My lack of chemistry knowledge is probably showing. When I said something about our bodies not being able to digest corn syrup I was vaguely remembering reading that all cells can metabolize glucose but only our livers can metabolize fructose, and the particularly bad corn syrup is high fructose corn syrup, HFCS. Ok, I have no idea how to tell what sceince is reputable or not, but I did a quick search and found this article which talks about how HFCS is produced by processing corn starch to yield glucose, and then processing the glucose to produce a high percentage of fructose. And that the fructose contains both glucsoe and fructose, but that when testing rats (of course) it's the fructose that was harmful.

Whew. Like I said, sceince is not really my thing, especially the part of sorting out what is valid and what isn't. If you are scared by everything you read, you'd live on rice and water, you know? But just intuitively I feel that coffee is a much more "natural" and less processed drink, so it is currently my vice of choice. Of course, on a nice hot day like today and being at the grocery store looking at the great deals on Dr. Pepper, espcially Diet Dr. Pepper which really does taste the best out of all diet soda when we are so close to swim-suit season, I am tempted, really tempted. But then my intuitive part kicks in and I wonder why I would avoid putting chemical fertilizers in my garden but then pour artifical sweeteners in my compost, I mean my body. ;) But then again, I don't even put sugar in my coffee, much less artifials sweeteners, I use blue agave. That is what happens when a southern girl move to California. ;)

Ok, enough rambling. Here is the one link I found quickly searching just to get the jist of what freaks me out about corn syrup.

Here is a link that might be useful: The Murky World of High-Fructose Corn Syrup

Table sugar (sucrose) breaks down into glucose and fructose. HCFS is sort of a shortcut for that process.

The problem with the sugars in soda aren't that they're harder to digest, but that they're easier to digest. The first step (breaking sucrose down into glucose and sucrose) has already been done.

Hm, for some reason this is really interesting to me and I'm curious about it. I found an article that seems to address the different scientific points of view on HFCS.

In any case, HFCS takes a complicated chemical process to produce which that just make me uncomfortable with so many uncertainties out there about it. And I guess if the scienfic community is still out as to the effects in our body, I'll avoid it in my compost.

And this doesn't even touch on artificial sweeteners like aspartame.

But I do put cardboard boxes with dyes in there a little. I guess it's really a to-each-their-own kind of thing.

Thanks for the responses. I definately didn't have a good understanding of it, and still don't really, but at least now I know I don't.

Here is a link that might be useful: Another take on it

Regarding HFCS: I read the "Murky" linked article on this stuff and would like to note that the author lists CCP, MTA after her name where one would expect to see degrees like M.A., M.S., Ph.D., and so on. I went to her website and read the "About." Well, these letters are CCP = Certified Culinary Professional; MTA = Masters in Travel (Tourism?) Administration.

Not (at least to me) very high-powered stuff, although she may indeed know what she's talking about.

I can't bring the citations to mind right now, but I do know that there have been some studies showing that the body's appetite regulator doesn't register HFCS like it does normal sugar. In other words, we'll just keep eating a dozen doughnuts or whatever if they're sweetened with the HFCS, whereas one or two (maybe three...) doughnuts with sugar will satisfy us.

Cynthia, who avoids the stuff when possible without completely torquing her life

Thanks for pointing that out, Cynthia. I've been reading more and that particular article definately leaned towards the-sky-is-falling side. Seems there is a sense it's not good, but no definitive conclusion as to exactly why or to what extent.

I'm with ya on avoiding, but not religiously. If I little gets in me, it's not gonna kills me; and if a little were to get in my compost, I'd not throw out the whole batch. :)

Interesting topic, sorry to get so way off point with the thread.

Hold on now, beer is much better for you than coffee or tea, and there is no question that it is better for you than soda. Beer is actually food and provides nutrition. To quote my major professor in college, "There is a sandwich in every beer!" and I can tell you he liked his sandwiches.

But back to the question of sugar in compost; what microbes are doing is using carbon for energy. To utilize the carbon incorporated into plant and animal tissue they need nitrogen. When you add sugar they use it as is without the nitrogen. So basically it is a waste of time unless you are naturally maternal and like to feed things. I have heard of people adding sugar to compost just to heat it up to meet the NOP standards for temperature, but it really contributes nothing the process of breaking down organic materials. So I wouldn't call it a 'green' or a 'brown' its more of a yellow.

I'd be more concerned about the genetically engineered (GE) corn that is used to make the high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS), than about the sugars themselves. These days, almost all corn that is not organically grown is GE. No one knows the long-term effects of GE food on people.

A fun recent documentary on the corn industry is King Korn. Two guys had their hair tested because they'd heard we're all made of corn these days, so went to the midwest and grew an acre of corn and then followed it through the food system. They tried to tour a HFCS processing plant, but found those places to be tightly guarded and off limits, so tried to make some of their own -- the goofiest part of the film. The most poignant moments are the interviews with local corn growers who won't eat it and say they know it's "crap," but grow it because of all the government subsidies. Without the massive subsidies, they said, they wouldn't grow corn at all because it'd lose money.

This is an interesting topic and I agree that sugar is a brown. This topic is closely related to understanding where the heat in composting comes from.

The mechanism is the Krebs Cycle. It is the oxidation of glucose for the production of ATP that is stored in the cell. Heat, CO2, and water are by products.

It's very interesting but a lenghty process that requires some study.

Here is a link that might be useful: Krebs Cycle