Benefits of Composting Paper Products

Dec 27, 2022 | Composting

Person in a red cardigan holding crumpled brown paper in a kitchen setting, symbolizing eco-friendly practices like composting or repurposing paper waste.

While the practice of composting is centuries old, its many practical and environmental benefits are starting to make the practice popular even among non-gardeners. But whether you have municipal compost, an indoor system or a backyard pile, you can benefit from composting paper products along with your kitchen scraps and yard waste. Not only can this practice help further reduce waste and facilitate sustainability, it can improve the quality of the potting soil your compost produces.

Fix Nitrogen-Heavy Compost

When compost is made up only of kitchen scraps and green yard and garden waste (such as lawn clippings and dead plants), it will likely become too nutrient dense and be more like fertilizer than a rich potting soil. As a result, planting in this kind of compost or using too much of it can damage or even kill your plants!

If you have a lot of carbon-dense plant matter, such as twigs or heavy tree leaves (such as oak or maple), this can correct the problem. If not, adding paper products is absolutely necessary for composting a balanced potting mix that won’t burn your plants and has a fluffy, moisture-retaining texture.

What Products Can I Compost?

Any paper product that’s free of plastic or toxic inks can be composted. Brown paper grocery bags are often marked as compostable on the bottom or sides, but if you’re not sure, just tear off the parts with ink, as well as any metal clips or plastic windows. Newspapers nowadays are printed with compost-safe, soy-based black inks, but don’t compost any pages with color print. Cardboard boxes are compostable, but be sure to cut away any portions with ink and to remove any staples or packing tape.

Non-glossy computer paper is compostable, but if it has any printing on it, you’ll want to make sure that the ink in your printer’s cartridge is plant-based (most are).

Unfortunately, most paperboard food packaging cannot be composted because it’s covered in a polyethylene coating to make it shiny. The same is true of magazines and many disposable plates and cups, but plain white ones are biodegradable and safe to compost. Oddly enough, compostable plastic cups and flatware cannot be composted in home compost as they require a high heat, high pressure municipal compost.

Other items you can compost include facial tissues, construction paper, toilet paper cardboard rolls, paper towels, cotton swabs (as long as they’re not the plastic kind), and toothpicks.

Layering and Turning

If you are composting large sheets of heavy paper and cardboard, it’s a good idea to tear them into smaller pieces and to avoid placing stacks of paper or cardboard directly into a compost pile. Because paper is dry and has fewer nutrients, it will take longer to break down if it isn’t surrounded by dirt and nitrogen-rich compost. Also, large sheets of paper and cardboard can reduce oxygen flow to the soil or compost beneath.

Layering paper with other compost will keep your microbial processes consistent throughout your pile for an even breakdown. Also, be sure to turn your compost every few weeks.

compostable tissue rolls

Environmental Benefits

A carbon-rich compost pile is good for more than just making potting soil. Compost sequesters carbon into the “fast” carbon cycle by making it nutritionally available for plants, insects and microbial life. You can use finished compost to transform dusty, dry and barren areas of ground into lush, carbon-capturing green plant life. Alternately, sprinkle dried compost over lawns, fields and grassland in forest areas to help increase the carbon capture abilities of the plants for many years to come.

Send Me the Free Plans

Before there was a Turbo Sift™, there was a simple rolling screen built to drop right into a 9-gallon mixing tub. Dan Lonowski, the founder of Wormgear, built it in 2015 when a friend asked for help screening his vermicompost, and it did one job beautifully: turn finished compost and worm castings into clean, crumbly material without the back-breaking shake-and-sieve routine.

The idea is elegant in its simplicity. A screen on casters rolls back and forth over a frame that rests on the tub. Load it, roll it, and clean compost drops through while the chunky bits ride along on top. That original screener is the design the Turbo Sift™ grew from, and the plans, dated 2015, are free to download below.

This guide is for home composters and worm farmers who want cleaner compost and castings, and for anyone who likes a good story about how a real tool gets made.

The sifter that started it all

Every good tool starts as an answer to a real problem, and the Turbo Sift™ started with Dan Lonowski.

Back in 2015, the Wormgear founder shared this vermicompost screener, sized to drop straight into a standard 9-gallon mixing tub, and filmed the build (video below). The concept was smart in its simplicity: put the screen on casters so it rolls across a frame, and let gravity do the sifting instead of your shoulders. Fine castings and finished compost fall through the mesh into the tub, and the unfinished chunks ride along on top, ready to go back in the pile.

That design worked well enough to become the blueprint for what came next. Real-world use pointed straight at what a production tool should improve: screens you can swap for different jobs, a build that shrugs off daily use, and an even smoother roll. Those lessons became the Turbo Sift™. So the plans below are more than a weekend project. They are where the Turbo Sift™ began.

Why sift your compost and castings?

Sifting is the step most people skip, and it is the one that makes compost look and perform like the bagged stuff at the garden center. Here is what it does for you:

Cleaner, finer material. Screening pulls out sticks, stones, and un-decomposed scraps, leaving smooth compost that spreads evenly and will not clog a seeder or planter.
Better results in the garden. Fine, uniform compost blends into potting mix and topdressing far better than lumpy compost.
A second chance for the big pieces. Whatever stays on the screen goes right back into the pile to finish breaking down. Nothing is wasted.
Kinder to your worms. When you harvest worm castings, a screen separates the finished castings while gently returning worms and cocoons to the bin. Sift your “black gold” and keep your workforce happy.

What you will build: the two-part prototype

The whole design comes down to two parts that work together:

The frame. A low wooden frame that rests across the top of a 9-gallon mixing tub (a standard mortar or muck tub). This is the stationary base that holds everything steady.
The rolling screen. A shallow, screened tray on casters that sits on the frame and rolls back and forth. This is where the sifting happens.

Load compost onto the rolling screen, push it gently across the frame, and the fine material rains down into the tub below while the oversized chunks ride along on top. When you are done, tip the leftovers back into the pile. No shaking a heavy box by hand, no sore shoulders.

The Danner screener's wooden frame resting across a black mixing tub, with the rolling screen tray sitting on top of it.

What you will need

The full parts list is short, cheap, and available at any hardware store:

2 x 1×4 common #2 plank, 8 ft
1 x 1×2 cedar (7/8 x 1-1/2), 4 ft
1 x 3/4 x 1/8 x 48 in steel flat bar
5 x 1-1/2 in rigid casters
1 roll 1/4 in hardware cloth (2 ft x 5 ft)
Screws: 26 x #8 x 1 in panhead sheet-metal, 16 x 2 in deck, 24 x 1-1/4 in deck

Tools: a saw, a drill, a screwdriver bit, and tin snips for the hardware cloth. That is it.

The exact cut list, drill guide, and assembly drawings are in the free download so you can build it right the first time.

Close-up of the rolling screen's hardware cloth held down by steel strips, with a caster at the corner and bits of compost caught on the mesh.

How it works, step by step

Set the frame across the top of an empty 9-gallon mixing tub.
Place the rolling screen on the frame so its casters sit on the rails.
Shovel finished compost (or worm castings) onto the screen.
Roll the screen back and forth a few times.
Fine, finished compost falls through the 1/4 inch mesh into the tub. The chunky, unfinished bits stay on the screen.
Toss the leftovers back into the compost pile or worm bin to keep breaking down.

Side view of the wooden frame across the top of a black mixing tub, with the rolling screen sitting on the frame.

Want to build it? Grab the plans, free

If this looks like your kind of weekend, the plans are yours. Dan turned the original prototype drawing into a clean, printable PDF with every cut, every measurement, and the drill guide, so you can build it right the first time instead of guessing.

Just say where to send it. Drop your email below and the plans land in your inbox right away. No cost, no catch, just the blueprint that started the Turbo Sift™, plus the occasional composting tip and a first look at what Wormgear is building next.

From prototype to Turbo Sift™

Building the original is a genuinely satisfying weekend project, and for a single bin it still does the job. But the reason the Turbo Sift™ exists is that Dan kept using this prototype and kept spotting ways to make it better.

The Turbo Sift™ is what those years of sifting taught him: interchangeable screens so you can switch between coarse compost and fine castings, a build made to take daily abuse, and a smoother, more ergonomic motion. Same simple idea that started on a mixing tub, refined into a tool built for the long haul.

Build the prototype for the story and the weekend. Reach for the Turbo Sift™ when you want the finished thing.

A Wormgear Turbo Sift sieve on its steel plate across a black tub, with finished dark compost sifted into the tub below.

Frequently asked questions

Is this the same as the Turbo Sift™? Not quite. This is Dan Lonowski’s original DIY prototype, the design the Turbo Sift™ grew from. The Turbo Sift™ is the engineered version, with interchangeable screens, a more durable build, and a smoother motion. The plans here let you build the original for yourself.

What size mesh should I use for sifting compost? A 1/4 inch hardware cloth is the sweet spot for general compost. It lets finished material through while catching most sticks and stones. For very fine worm castings or seed-starting mix, use a finer 1/8 inch mesh, though it sifts more slowly.

Can I sift worm castings with this? Yes. This design was built for vermicompost. A screen is one of the gentlest ways to harvest castings: the fine castings drop through while worms and cocoons stay on top so they can go back in the bin unharmed.

How long does it take to build? Most people finish in an afternoon. The cuts are straightforward and the parts list is short. Everything you need is in the free plans.

Ready to sift like a pro

A good sifter turns lumpy, half-finished compost into the clean, crumbly black gold your garden actually wants, and it keeps your worms exactly where they belong. Build Dan’s original prototype this weekend, or reach for the Turbo Sift™ it became when you are ready to level up.

Grab the free plans below and join the mission to make compost mainstream, one clean batch at a time.