I was hoping someone else would answer your question from your area! But since they haven’t I’ll add some thoughts.

I don’t have personal experience with the barrel system in your climate, but I’ve seen and read about other people’s systems  in Washington and they work just fine. You’ll need to wait longer to harvest the compost than in warmer climates (over a year, maybe 18 months or 2 years), but you could check after one year to see how it’s progressing.