ecological sanitation

Ecological Sanitation

Every year more than three million people die from water-related diseases, caused by lack of access to safe drinking water by more than one billion people and by lack of safe sanitation by nearly two billion people.The sewer system that is being promoted as the answer to poor sanitation in urgan areas is based on the assumption of unlimited water resources and it is bases on the situation of western european cities in 19th century. Civil engineers were allowed by vast economic growth in the industrial centres to ignore the natural cycles of rural life and natural environments.

In other regions of the world and nowadays even in the countries that do have sewerage it appears that the sewer system is not a feasible or optimal solution. The main reasons are that construction and maintenance costs go far beyond the financial means of most communities and that water shortage does not allow for proper functioning of the sewer system. If a sewerage network exists in a South country, it primarily serves the rich. Large volume of drinking water are used to flush, large volumes of grey and black water require treatment.

Costs which can only be afforded by a miniorty of affluent people. And it takes a large claim of the governments expenditure and the country’s fresh water resources too. More and more people start to realise that sewerage causes structural loss of natural resources and nutrients and does not serve the nations population.

Benefits of ecological sanitation
For people in water scarce countries the benefits of ecological sanitation are obvious. Individuals save water, the sanitation conditions will improve, high construction costs can be avoided. On a national and communal level, authorities realise the potential of water conservation, ground water protection, employment creation, increase food security and the reduction of wastewater management costs a ll benefits that can come by introducing ecological sanitation.

It has been proven that ecological sanitation and more precise that a urine diversion system has many advantages for individual households. The question that now has to be addressed is whether EcoSan can be the solution for an entire community. In other words, will urine diversion systems if applied on a communal scale and supported by a municipality become(even more) attractive to more individuals.

Communal ecological sanitation
WASTE wants to explore, develop and demonstrate the advantages of communal ecological
sanitation in order to meet the global need to develop sustainable and affordable sanitation,
in order towards:
Demand reduction for freshwater through water conservation and reuse
Efficient use of resources (waste nutrients) in urban agriculture and landscaping
Decrease of wastewater flows through prevention of wastewater production
Influencing consumer demand by presenting people with an option for sustainable and economic efficient

environmental sanitation
Integration of the use of ecological sanitation into municipal policy
Development of guidelines for ecological sanitation
The last two decades international water & sanitation experts and organisations have raised the question whether conventional centralised sewage management is the answer to the increasing sanitation problems and natural resource protection related to urbanisation.

Increasing numbers of people in the field have acknowledged that the focus for the years to come needs to be on waste prevention and reuse. In the light of high infrastructure costs per capita, water scarcity, decrease of valuable land space and population growth in urban areas and increasing uncontrolled wastewater flows WASTE questions the sustainability of centralised sewer network solutions and wants to contr ibute development of decentralised sanitation approaches.

At this moment, many ecological sanitation options are available world wide developed by scientists and artisans - from simple self-made toilets to sophisticated systems with electronic sensors and regulators.All these sanitation options are based on similar principles at the waste management hierarchy
mentioned in the ISWM policy paper:
Separate ‘waste’ at source
Avoiding freshwater use for transportation of the ‘waste’
Decentralised services provision (collection, recycling and storage)
Allow reuse of ‘waste’ as fertiliser and soil conditioner

Ecological sanitation will not only significantly reduce or even eliminate environmental pollution related to human excreta management; in the end it is cheaper than centralised sanitation. Large investments in sewer networks and wastewater plants can be avoided.

At the same time, this decentralised approach to waste management will enhance
opportunities for micro and small enterprises (MSE) in the water and sanitation sector.

WASTE wants to find the answer to the question, whether EcoSan can be a solution for entire communities and neighbourhoods if it is adopted and supported with sufficient inputs.Together with our partners, WASTE wants to study and demonstrate the application(s) of EcoSan systems on a communal scale with the aim to develop sustainable and affordable sanitation systems that are based on waste prevention, efficient resource management and promotion of markets for recycled resources even further.