permaculture

["John Schinnerer" <john@eco-living.net>]

Aloha,

>> These work great - used 'em myself - but they are
>> non-optimal/high-maintenance, especially if communal and/or
>> large/extended-family use.  Examples on request...
> hmmm...I'd like to know more about system failures...very important!

They *can* work - it's not the technology per se, it's the human factor (go
figure... :-).  More than a few people using one means they have to be emptied
(and cleaned and prepped for use again, etc.) pretty darn often - and properly
- and so on.  The more users and the higher the maintenance need, the more
likely it appears that any given person will assume someone else will take
care of it - or will take it upon themselves repeatedly but wish that someone
else would take care of it - or will resent that someone else didn't take care
of it - or will decide to be overwhelmed and ignore it...and so on.

Nothing like a bucket of *real* fecal matter to bring to the surface inner
human "fecal matter" (that's a technical term... ;-)

And given that any kind of composting toilet is new to most people, and the
fecephobia our culture mostly has, it's not real easy to spread the
maintenance tasks around to 'newbies' for this kind of composting toilet
setup.  This seems especially likely for short-term transient populations
(PDCs and other workshops,  festivals, etc.).

I set up a demo humanure bucket toilet for Claude's course at Green Mtn. PC
this past September.  It was a great demo to have, as he hadn't gotten a more
high-volume composting toilet built yet, but I wouldn't want to do it for more
than a short period for a bunch of people.  Way too much maintenance (yes,
people sure did use it!).

La'akea PC gardens had been using multiple humanure bucket systems - including
for the surge of people attending their PDCs, other courses, etc. - last I
heard they had quit using them, at least for high-traffic, because they just
didn't keep up and then it got kinda ugly...barrels of consolidated humanure
that nobody wanted to deal with any more...they're looking for higher-volume
options.

>> For a community-use/large family situation I recommend lower-maintenance
double-vault type composting toilets -

> YES! these are great anywhere I've seen them (especially retreat centres
that get large fluctuations in useage)...
> what's a CMU (cinder-mortar block maybe??)

Concrete Masonry Unit - various sizes and shapes, "cinderblock"... not my top
preferred material, but if they're handy and cheap they work.

>..for double vaults, you could
> also use old oil drums if you have them...when its full seal it up and store
it while it "cures".

Plastic drums best, especially in wet tropics - last looong, never rust
through (yecchhhh... :-p)
There are a variety of "removable drum" systems - kinda like a giant humanure
bucket but let it cook in the drum until it's done.  Sunny John is one, the
info is online:

http://sunnyjohn.com/

Still more maintenance than vault units if lots of users - but much less, and
more contained than 5-gal bucket.  I've used a few, and have approximate stats
on one, at Malu 'Aina in Hawai'i - takes about a month for an average of four
to five everyday users to fill a drum, then it has to be changed - and for a
year cycle, a dozen or so drums are needed.  That's using fairly fine sawdust
for carbon - with shavings or nut husks or other bulkier carbon it would fill
quicker.

A double-vault that can hold a year's worth on average per vault only needs
maintenance...once a year!

> YES! However, based on work I've done in Cuba (waste planning for Havana and
design of a Solar Aquatics system there), the people generally have a much
higher RESISTANCE level too (I've seen the same thing in First Nations
communities in Northern Canada). That's part of the reason visitors become
ill when they vivist "third world" places but locals don't.

Hmmm, that would make sense.  I heard John Jeavons, when someone asked him how
the Chinese deal with parasites and pathogens perpetuated by their
long-running direct use of "raw" humanure, say something like "Welllll....they
just seem to roll with it..."

> In general: humanure can be good (very good in fact), but it can also lead
to problems. People need to LEARN what they are doing and why. This applies
for Haiti and for Idaho.

Yep, that's a pretty universal principle...and it applies to all the systems,
even the 'safer' ones like vaults and big barrels and so on.



John Schinnerer - MA, Whole Systems Design
------------------------------------------
- Eco-Living -
Cultural & Ecological Designing
People - Place - Learning - Integration
john@eco-living.net
http://eco-living.net