Designing Ecological Habitats - Gaia Education

Design witH tHe flow 265
Imagine that it took our bodies, yes our human bodies, millions of years
to design a digestive system whereby at the end of a lengthy and delicate
process we excrete the solids through one channel and the liquids are
discharged through another. And to think, in modern buildings, the first
thing we do is mix them with… drinking water! If our method of acquiring
nutrients were to blend solid and liquid waste, then why do we have this
complex system of kidneys, liver and intestines? And if drinking water
can be thought of as a ‘commons’, for which everyone should have ample
access, how can we dump these waste products into the drinking water? It
seems that we are not seeing the connections (again).
Water is the most precious substance on Earth. Drinking-water is expensive
and not easily available to the whole population, so why do we spoil water by
mixing feces and urine in it? Urine is a wonderful liquid. It is very rich in potassium,
one of the core components for making our hearts pump. Urine should
not be wasted but should be ploughed back into the nutrient cycle. Did we forget
that the Roman emperor had the royal privilege of collecting urine from his
citizens? Today, urine and feces are simply discharged and imagined ‘gone and
vanished’. In reality, they end up in expensive water treatment systems where
the organic matter is chemically treated through the expense of massive energy.
The feces are a different matter. After all, that is the reason why they are
separated from the urine in the first place. If you combine feces and urine,
you get a typical smell, one that we really do not like around us. If you
keep feces and urine separate, as was intended, then there is no smell on the
condition that there is a flow of air that dries out the feces rather quickly.
That is the function of the dry separation toilet that has been designed and
operated for many years, while fine-tuned in recent history by Dr. Matts
Wolgast, the Swedish scientist from Uppsala University.
If we reduce the flow of water by eliminating the need to use water as
the transporter of feces and urine to central water treatment plants where
E. Coli and Salmonella thrive, then we save a lot of risks that are linked to
dealing with these potential carriers of illness. We are, of course, aware of
the danger and therefore pour harsh chemicals into the system so that we can
control the potential bacterial infections. Whereas bactericides eliminate the
risk of diseases, they also render the water totally useless. There is no reason
to deal with the health consequences of mixing feces and urine by adding
chemicals – simply do not mix the two as was originally intended!
We think of water as the liquid that flows through pipes from somewhere
where it is in abundance to wherever it is needed. Cities have established
a vast network of water redistribution. Imagine the thousands of miles of
pipe that bring water from the Colorado River to distribute throughout Los
Angeles. Imagine the huge investments upstate New York is making to
install septic tanks in order to preserve its catchment area. And now imagine
what happens to all that rainwater? It is simply drained away! How can this
be possible? The state of Colorado even prohibits residents from capturing
rainwater; yet at a time when water is increasingly costly, how could it ever
be permitted to simply flow into a sewage system when it could generate
electricity or offer irrigation to farmers?