green-technologies

Now’s the time for eco-friendly waterless toilets

Conventional flush toilets have been around for over a hundred years and is a symbol of modern and affluent living. In the developing world, homes with indoor flush toilet are considered a luxury. Even so, flush toilets are extremely inefficient as an instrument for sanitation and are very damaging to the environment.

Consider this: it takes an average of 13 liters (3.4 US gallons) of water per flush for conventional flush toilets. Even with the more efficient HET (High Efficiency Toilets), which came to being as a result of a 1992 Energy Policy Act passed by the United States Congress, requires 4.8 liters (1.28 US gallons) of water per flush.

In remote villages without proper connectivity to sewage treatment plants, flushed dirty water is led to a septic tank in the ground where it is to be treated. When properly designed, septic tanks provide an effective means of treating human wastes. The problem with the septic system however is that in areas with high water table, dirty water could permeate into the groundwater resulting in contamination. In cases where the amount of dirty water flowing into the septic tank is more than the septic tank capacity, dirty water will not be adequately treated before being discharged.

One alternative to flush toilets and septic tanks is the composting toilet. Although not a new technology, it could be the perfect solution to address sanitary issues in remote and/or poor villages as well as a solution to multiple environmental issues such as shortage of fresh potable water, pollution of rivers, streams, coastal waters and underground water table. Composting toilets are also resilient to calamities such as floods where according to Eco-San, a composting toilet manufacturer. When the tsunami hit South Asia in 2004, villages in southern Kerala, India were flooded for weeks and conventional toilets overflowed, exposing waste contents from the pits contaminating the floodwaters. Whereas composting toilets did not have this problem.

Composting toilets were probably first used by the Chinese where urine and solid excrement are separated and allowed to decomposed naturally and subsequently applied on plant crops as fertilizers. The modern composting toilets were later introduced in Scandinavia in the early 1900’s and later introduced to the United States in 1970s.

Modern composting toilets are odorless, use little or no water, and are 100% environmentally sound. Natural aerobic decomposition is aided with the ample ventilation and maintained at temperatures between 40 and 60 degrees Celsius. Sometimes microbial “starter” culture is added initially to enhance the decomposition process. The result is compost that is rich in nutrients, free of pathogens and can be readily applied in the garden or mixed with soil used for potted plants.

There are a number of manufacturers of composting toilets around the world, mostly in the US, Canada, Sweden and Australia. Some are fully self-contained single units while others may have a detached remote composting chamber fed by one or more seats. There are also DIY-type composting toilets from composting enthusiasts with instructions readily available online.

In North America, composting toilets have been installed in a number of facilities including the Bronx Zoo and Queens Botanical Garden in New York, Sweetwater Creek State Park in Georgia, the New Jersey National Golf Club, The Bunker Interpretive Center at Calvin College in Michigan and the C.K. Choi Building located in the Univesity of British Columbia in Vancouver.

Elsewhere, composting toilets have been installed in public toilets along E6 highway in Sweden, the Cooloola section of the Great Sandy National Park in Australia and multi-storey houses in Bielefeld and Rostock Germany.

Composting Toilet Manufacturer Links:

Bio-Sun Systems
Biolan
Biolet
Clivus Multrum
Compost Era
Composting Toilet Systems
Cotuit Dry Toilets
Eco-Solutions
Eco Toilets
Ekolet
Enviro Options
Envirolet
Nature Loo
Phoenix Composting Toilet Systems
Rota-Loo
Separett
Sun Frost
Sun-Mar

Composting Toilet DIY Links:
Compost Toilet DIY by www.aselfsufficientlife.com
Composting Toilet: Do It Yourself by www.slow-express-journey.com
DIY Composting Toilet by www.cropscheme.org
Solar Composting Advanced Toilet by www.solartoilet.com