Hi all!
I was asked to make a presentation for some kind of eco-festival concerning the future of Stekene and all the environmental consequences…
I made some panels to present the project and it only seemed logic to put them online for you to see them. So you can download it by clicking here.
It’ all writen in Dutch… sorry for that, in time I will translate them to english asswel..
You could read in the previous posts that I allready have a workingspace and water. Now the only thing I need more is a toilet!
The toilet is of a major importance to nature! We can try to recycle plastics, to sort paper and glass, but as long as we are not organising our “human waste” in a good way we are not helping nature one bit!
You might ask yourself why human waste would be harmfull… well.. it wouldn’t be harmfull if we were with only a few million humans on earth and if we would live like nomads… this way human waste would be a great fertiliser. The main problem is that we tend to hook up in cities and villages all together… putting a great amount of nitrates and bacterians in the ground. We pollute or own underground watersupply !!!
It’s not easy to solve this problem… and I didn’t find any good solution to stop the pollution totally. There might be a sollution which involves mixing urine with some chemicals to neutralise it, but I wouldn’t be sure that these chemicals (and the production of it) would be that ecologically. And it would make you dependant of the chemicals… which isn’t my way of doing things…
The best solution I found untill now is a composting toilet.
There are many different forms of a composting toilet and some are worth to carry the name, others aren’t.
The main trick to a good compostingtoilet is to divide urine and faeces before they are processed. How?
In my compostingtoilet I used a metal plate dividing the toilet in two compartments. One directs the urine to a purifying pond and the other is collecting faeces. These faeces are kept dry and will make up a good compost later on.
Here are some pictures of the construction. This is only a temporary toilet (for use during the building), the permanent one will be integrated into the house later on.
First I put some vertical poles into the ground. Remember this is only a temporare construction. If you want to make a permanent one, it would be better to put some kind of stone fundaments underneath so the wood wouldn’t rotten .
Next I made a wooden skeleton off it. Make sure all your poles are perfectly vertical and at fixed dimensions. I wasn’t that fixated on making it perfect so I didn’t mind having a perfect straight construction, but my god! Did I regret it later!
The day before I started the construction I found allot of wood in a container nearby, so I used it all to coverup the toilet! I didn’t spend a dime on this compostingtoilet, even the nails are recovered from the old chalet!
Notice the slope underneth the sitting area. This is the area where the faeces are collected and dryed. If I would do it over I would make the slope seperately so it can always be replaced without a problem.
Also note the hose connected with this chamber… this is to ventillate the collecting room and prevent it from getting moisted.
The ventillation hose connected to a chimney on the roof…
In front of the slope there is a double pole. This allows me to slide a plate in between them necessary to empty the collecting room when the faeces are composted (after about 1 year if you use it regulary with about 4 people).
On the picture below you can see the toilet almost finnished… On the roof I put a plastic sheet covered with ground. I used the ground of the forest and only one week later there were allready growing little plants o the roof!
Notice also the metal plate underneath the toilet. This plate collects urine. On one hand the urine is collected seperately in the seating of the toilet and directed to this plate via a plastic tube (PVC !) on the other hand if any urine would make it to the collectiong room it would drip throught the wooden plates onto the metal plate and directed to the purifying pond. (this might be more clear on the technical drawings –> see underneath).
The roof covered with plastic:
Normally the ground and plants would regulate the rainwater. But to be sure there wouldn’t be too much water on the roof I made a little opening in the roof and coverd it with a perforatd metal plate. Again.. if this would have been a permanent toilet I would make it more durable.
And this is the result (it only needs a door):
Oohyeah! I put some straw on the slope underneath. this way the moist can be absorbed and the faeces don’t fall through easily.
How to use this toilet?
It’s important to throw a handfull of sawdust after every use. It’s also important to close the lit to prevent most of the insects to get inside.
There is no need to use water for flushing.
I have been using the toilet for some weeks now and I dare everyone to stick his head inside the collecting room… you won’t smell a thing!
More information on the technical side of all this, see page 8 of the brochure