permaculture

[Steve Hart <stevenlawrencehart@gmail.com>]

Hi John

Try this..photos on the way..Steve

CITY SEWAGE a technological revolution waiting to happen.

Town and city sewage is commonly a large scale mainstream consulting
engineers technology waiting for the Permaculture solution to recognize its
wealth. Yes there is a tremendous amount of resources available in this
perceived problematic nuisance that is apparently containing numerous
serious health risks to community.  Which, in itself, is one good reason
why most local authority politicians and bureaucrats alike prefer to hand
the whole problem over to consultants. I asked the question during my first
PDC in Tasmania 1981.  Why have we not seen solutions to respond to the
wealth of resources that exist in this nutrient rich water-course. The
answer is amazingly simple which didn’t take me long to figure out. I went
on a global mission to search it out. Looking into every possible
technology attending international conferences on the whole subject and
asking unanswerable never before asked questions. Well it seemed that line
of questioning upset a few of the vested interests in the industry and
started to rattle the potential wealth many were making from the industry.

It wasn’t until I spent time with research scientists Stoica and Marioana
Godeanu in Romania that I found how much wealth these consulting engineers
were making out of sewage.   The Romanian models proved that there was an
efficiency gap of seventeen thousand percent. Yes 17,000%. Now convert that
to dollars. I had been alerted to these issues by Viet Ngo the American
Vietnamese engineer and constructor of the Lemna Systems. Uwe Burke the
German Design Ecologist who teamed up with Englishman Mark Moodie to design
and build cascading wetlands, ex Nassar scientist Billy Wolverton  who
designed and built the integrated wetlands  all commented on these ruling
cabals with considerable vested interest in controlling the worlds sewage
industry as too did George Chan the famous Chinese design engineer and
scientist who built integrated wetlands throughout south east asia.

PHOTO 1..Stoica. Marioara Me.

The remaining question is, will we ever see a system of the efficiency
possible. That of 17,000 % greater than what exists today. Perhaps only if
an individual developer building a community can be convinced of the
economic savings possible. As further testament to the scale of this issue
myself and Permaculture consultant landscape architect Dennis Scott
designed a system in competition with consulting engineers for a city of
population one million. We costed it to detail realizing a capital cost of
seven million dollars, $7M, with a very conservative profit through farming
the resources of five hundred thousand dollars, $500,000, annually.  We
lost the debate to realize international consulting engineers won the
contract with an estimated capital cost of 120 million dollars, $M120, and
an annual operating cost of three million dollars, M$3. The final build
cost was in fact 240 million dollars, M$240 and annual costs rise every
year.

Why do I share this viewpoint with you? It is simply a realization that
very few have yet realized. Many in our Permaculture world have ventured
into saner more responsive sewage design systems and there are books and
many articles to prove it. Most of these are small scale one household or
best a cluster of houses and a combined resource building. The Farm in
Tennessee has an excellent example of this and tells also of the bureacrazy
that controlled the design construction and performances. The Rudolf
stainer seminarist in Jarna Sweden also a good example. Am I irritated?
Perhaps you can read this into my story here. Too right I am irritated for
I see the tremendous resource waste, which passes us by daily. Why is
this?  Perhaps we have been conditioned to respecting sewage as a nasty
with many health issues and nuisances that needs to be dealt with by
someone else. Perhaps that’s why we are so pleased just to press the button
and flush it out of sight and out of mind.  This is our western worlds
society. There are many similar patterns when we explore our resource
mindlessness. Especially if we have had the good fortune of visiting
villages of China, South East Asia, India and Pakistan or even exploring
where the waste streams of Dubai end up.

The solutions are simple. We need to recognize that sewage as we know it in
the city pipeline is resource rich water. It is not a nuisance but a
potential of many proportions. So we have an attitude shift. We also need
to realize that it is a resource and how can we as great Permaculture
designers recognize as many as possible and design them into our systems.
Many Permaculture folk prefer to argue for dry compost toilets. However
that attitude is again from a viewpoint of detrimental waste rather than a
resource rich commodity. What resource streams can be developed from dry
composted sewage as compared to water borne sewage systems?  In nature
there is a myriad of flora and fauna, invertebrae and crustacea, fungus and
microbes that exist in the worlds of nutrient, mineral and energy
conversion. Godeanu research which had a stream of graduate scientists and
engineers involved realized these values. They also linked the science of
pyramids and cosmic electromagnetic energy to realize far greater values.

PHOTO 2…pyramid

The integrated indoor wetlands of John Todd go a long way to offering
solutions. However my international research and design modeling suggests
there are more, greater solutions. The appropriate answers depend on the
scale of the system. When we envisage a city having one sewage plant the
greatest cost will be in the reticulated piping infrastructure, which also
requires pump stations. One city could have a system made up of many
satellite systems that fed gardens and productive parks or city farms. The
outfall to the systems is also a major concern and must also be realized in
its fullest. Invariably these are into natural waterways, streams, harbours
and oceans. There are no environmental laws restricting quality of sewage
outfall into nature. There are guidelines only and these are far to lean
and rarely policed. Some indigenous cultures suggest a zero tolerance of
contaminant to nature. Which, I do agree with. This is a further attitude
change that is sought. So the solutions are simple. But attitude change is
needed first, or, a developer keen to prove considerable resource
efficiency and a cleaner environment while creating an aesthetic productive
garden from this hidden resource through integrating all the aforementioned
creators and designers. Thats a key in Permaculture design as well isn't
it. Designing the linkages.

As a Permaculture Design Consultant, an Architect, a Landscape Architect
and Urban Designer who integrates all design disciplines I see this
industry as one for our industry, Permaculture, to yet enter, challenge and
supply solutions.

Steve Hart.


On 21 August 2013 02:01, John Wages <jwages@earthlink.net> wrote:

> As we approach the target date for submissions to the upcoming
> "Appropriate Technology" issue of the Permaculture Activist, we have room
> for several more articles.  Anyone interested in writing on rocket stoves,
> solar heating/drying, "passive" refrigeration, tools for gardening or
> small-scale farming, tools for natural building, aquaculture systems, or
> other down-to-earth, "how-to" aspects of Appropriate Technology, please
> feel free to contact me.  We'd like this to be a resource-packed issue.
>  Perhaps you can help.  Thanks.
>
> John
>
> John Wages
> Editor, the Permaculture Activist
> wagesjm@gmail.com
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>



-- 
Kia ora

[image: Picture]
*Steve Hart*
Ecology Architect
skype: stevenlawrencehart