5 research outputs found
Waterless urinals: a proposal to save water and recover urine nutrients in Africa
Waterless urinals have two important advantages compared to conventional water-flushed
urinals: They
save water and they allow the collection of undiluted urine, which – because of its nitrogen and
phosphorus content is
a valuable resource as fertiliser in agriculture. In the context of African
developing countries, costs and maintenance requirements of waterless urinals need to be as low as
possible. Despite the fact that hundreds of thousands of waterless (and odourless) urinals are now
already in use worldwide, many municipalities are not yet aware of their existence or are reluctant to
accept them as a viable option. This paper aims to reduce this knowledge gap by describing available
models, odour control methods in waterless urinals (flat rubber tube, silicon curtain valve or sealant
liquid), and the aspects to be considered regarding maintenance requirements and costs. Waterless
urinals are a promising step towards achieving water saving, more sustainable sanitation and reduced
dependency on costly artificial fertilisers, thus contributing to poverty reduction
Up-scaling lessons from the EU-Sida-GTZ Ecosan promotion project in Kenya
This paper analyses the requirements for up-scaling of sustainable sanitation systems based on the lessons learnt from the EU-Sida-GTZ EcoSan Promotion Project (EPP) in Kenya. The EPP reached 50,000 users with reuse oriented sanitation systems (ecosan). The project areas for urine diversion dehydration toilets (UDDTs) were villages in rural and peri-urban areas of Kenya where farming is practiced and cholera is common during the rainy season. The total number of installed UDDTs in households and schools was 984 with an estimated 20,000 users. The UDDTs were implemented either directly through Community Based Organisations (CBOs), or via the pro-poor basket fund called Water Services Trust Fund (WSTF) together with the regional Water Services Boards (WSBs) and CBOs. Future strategies for up-scaling must provide a comprehensive strategy to bundle resources and create synergies of the sanitation related sectors in Kenya with a focus on behaviour change and sanitation market development that can provide sustained demand and trigger community investment in sanitation
Tackling the urban waste and food crises simultaneously and sustainably - examples from the Philippines and Burkina Faso
The current urban population of 3.3 billion is expected to reach 5 billion by 2030. This urbanisation of
the global population is equally an urbanisation of poverty. Cities concentrate people, huge volumes of
excreta and nutrients from vast areas of farmland into a limited area. For the urban poor in particular,
these accumulations result in major health problems and a low standard of living. In recent decades
sanitation practitioners and researchers have been working on modern sanitation systems that address
two related urban problems the
waste and the food production problem. The approaches developed are
usually considered under the term ecological sanitation (ecosan) and are based on recognising the value
of nutrients as part of a sustainable wastewater management system. Two large-scale
projects from the
Philippines and Burkina Faso, are presented to illustrate the benefit to the urban poor offered by
affordable ecosan alternatives in
terms of sanitation and fertiliser production
Alternative solutions for challenging environments: a look at UNICEF-assisted ecosan projects worldwide
This paper summarises information from 20 UNICEF-assisted ecological sanitation projects in 12 countries. The projects varied widely in size from 95 users for a project with household urine diversion dehydration toilets (UDDTs) in Bangladesh up to 23,000 users under emergency conditions in Zimbabwe. They share characteristics of purpose, scope, challenges, opportunities and sanitation technologies, which were mainly UDDTs and composting toilets. Specific insights are given for the projects in Bangladesh and Rwanda where large-scale ecological sanitation „ecosan‟ programs are currently underway. We discuss the potential to scale-up initiatives by providing increased technical back-up support to users, greater linkages with community-led total sanitation and with income generation initiatives via higher agricultural yields. In the context of growing urbanisation and hydro-geological challenges, this paper highlights that “ecosan technologies” (such as UDDTs) can be a suitable technical solution where pit-based toilets are impossible to be implemented sustainably
Provision of sustainable sanitation in emergency situations: role of ecosan
This paper describes the potential of ecological sanitation (ecosan), and in particular of urine-diversion dehydrating
(UDD) toilets, to provide sustainable excreta disposal in emergency situations in low-income countries. Three case studies
of emergency sanitation were analysed: El Salvador (hurricane), Afghanistan (civil war) and Pakistan (earthquake).
The analysis of these case studies has shown that the systems implemented in the long-term phase of the emergency were
sometimes more sustainable than what was in place before the emergency occurred. For UDD toilets to be viable during
emergency situations, specific criteria have to be in place. The essential criteria include awareness and expertise among
aid agencies, ease of transportation and quick installation of standardised UDD units, stage and duration of emergency
and the role of government in sanitation provision. For emergency situations in low-income countries, we propose the
use of UDD toilets (e.g. with pre-fabricated urine-diversion squatting pans) as a suitable excreta management option,
particularly in those instances where pit latrines are not sustainable in the longer term