Samuel Benoit

A couple posts ago as I told you about about the research I am doing on a waste water stream in Hubli, Karnataka, and we started to think about the idea of pee-pee and poo-poo as an important resource rather than something not to be thought on or digust, um, discussed. Pursuant to this research, I attended a short course in Delhi called City Water and Decentralized Wastewater

Management: Alternative Paradigms, which in this context means Urban Poo And What To Do With It. It was given by the Water Team of the environmental research and education organization, the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE). About half of the course was spent in the classroom learning about the challenge to India’s cities and new as well as ancient methods of decentralized waste management, the other half was spent on field trips. Let’s start there.

Museum of Toilets

Sulabh International Social Service Organization is an Indian NGO based on Ghandian principles that promotes new sanitation technology to protect the environment and uplift the country’s many scavengers. They have provided millions of sustainable and sanitary toilet facilities across India. Sulabh cannot afford to be prudish when it comes to human waste in their ongoing crusade to deal with it, and nor can we. As part of their campaign to remind people of what they try to forget, they established arguably the world’s only toilet museum at their headquarters in Delhi.

At the toilet museum we learned that the basic technology goes back much further than most think, and like all that is good in the world, may have actually originated in India. The very charismatic and hilarous guide took us through this history of civilization illustrated with photos, ancient etchings and many toilets, where we learned that the darkest moment in this history of civilization may have been the introduction of the water closet, or the toilet as you probably know it. You may not know it from the dominance of the john that toilet technology has been progressing even if it has left most of us with means behind.

Outside the museum we were shown a number of models of the twin-pit toilets that Sulabh is promoting and the many uses of the by-products, such as fertilizer and irrigation, biogas and fart-powered lamps.

Cruise on the Yamuna River

One of the pet projects of the CSE is addressing the crisis in their own Delhi backyard, the transformation of the Yamuna, one of India’s holiest rivers – into a sewage canal. Somehow after years of discussion and millions of spending the river remains without a hope.The river is now totally inhospitable to any life, dead, which is a bad thing. The plants and animals that are basic to healthy rivers are part of its resilience and natural ability to process sewage.

The CSE proposes a paradigm other than the expensive imported technology of sewage treatment plants that cannot possibly answer to India’s needs. This paradigm is based on decentralizing sewage treatment and looking at sewage as a resource rather than unholy stuff that has to be flushed away with copious amounts of drinking water.

Here the extremes of wealth and poverty take the form of planners and engineers bending over backwards to ensure the flow of water in and out of wealthy nieghbourhoods while the poor downstream face a drinking water deficit and waste water surplus. This is what Anil Agarwal, the founder of the CSE called the Political Economy of Defication.

Along with those two field trips we were taken to a mega western-style sewage treatment plant, and some local colleges and institutes that have taken their sewage into their own hands with on-site treatment plants. Through this, time spent in the CSE’s uber-green head offices, and the pesentation and practicals in the classroom and we were exposed to a wealth of new options.

Through separation of grey, brown and yellow water for different processing and reuse (flushing; fertilizer and energy; and irrigation respectivley) along with collection of rainwater, many residences and organizations have taken themselves off the water grid while replenshing thier groundwater supply. It’s an ‘I have a dream’ sort of thing.

Coming up, more on my rasinish nephew and just a little more poop.  Click here to view my set of photos from the course on flickr.