Don’t Flush That Poo Away: Recycle Human Waste With the Humanure System
Isn’t it just so convenient that we flush our poop away, down the toilet, never to return? I mean, literally speaking, but metaphorically, too. We flush away our poop, like it’s a problem that we don’t want to deal with. But little do we realize, there’s value in everything, even that which might stink, and which we’d rather send away down a porcelain bowl.
Pooping is a natural process, and doing it in a bowl of drinking water (which must only later be treated with nasty chemicals so that we can reuse this same water) is a horrific waste, and polluting, too. That’s where the humanure system comes in.
The term “humanure” refers to human waste which is recycled by methods of composting, and which can later be used for gardening or agricultural purposes. Before you think: “I don’t want dookie on my daisies!”, remember that everything (everything natural, that is) breaks down in due time. So let’s talk about humanure, and how human waste can be more effectively recycled and reused, instead of letting it continue to pollute ever-precious drinking water supplies. Perhaps by the end of this post, you too will think that flushing your crap away is just as crazy as any other form of pollution.
Make your own humanure system
The term “humanure” has been popularized by Joseph Jenkins in The Humanure Handbook, a down and dirty guidebook to recycling human waste for use as a soil amendment. How does one create their own humanure system for purposes of recycling human poo?
Well, instead of using a toilet, you might choose to use the bucket system, which is essentially a five gallon bucket. (See above photo for an example.) After doing one’s business, sawdust or straw is sprinkled on the bucket’s contents to prevent odor, add carbon, and absorb liquids. (Believe me: it really does keep down odor.) Humanure can then be dumped into compost bins, where it decomposes and cures after one to two years. After this time, you are left with nothing but purely organic matter, something quite like dirt. As long as the humanare is given enough time to decompose, there should be no fear about the spread of pathogens, and this material can be used as a soil amendment in gardening or agriculture. It’s that simple! It’s nature at its finest.
After using the humanure system at my home, Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage for well over a year, it feels very strange to me to use a restroom or bathroom where I must flush away my waste. It just feels so… wrong. Really!
For the full details on humanure and making your own humanure system, I highly recommend The Humanure Handbook, which is actually available for free online (in multiple languages, no less!) Human waste is someting to be embraced (well, ok, not literally), and recycled, not flushed away to continue polluting sensitive water tables.
(Image credit: Jenkins Publishing)
I completely agree with Ziggy on this matter. We have been taught that human fecal matter needs to be piped away in the sewage system, BUT we also are taught to buy composted cow manure for our gardens. Why not use our own waste (after its been composted) and put it back into the earth to grow yummy organic food? Flushing poop away is like flushing money down the toilet.
It will be interesting to see how methods such as this can be implemented in high-density cities. How could composting toilets be designed into a large apartment complex, for example? Many things will have to be rethought for that sort of change to happen, including health and building codes.
Here in Boston the city takes all our poop and turns it into fertilizer pellets that it then sells to farmers. I remember back in grade school (early 90’s) a presentation by one of the workers from the sewage plant on the system. He even brought in some of the pellets to show us that there was no odor and that it simply was not as crazy as we all thought at first.
Yes, they do the same here with ours. Therefore, I’ll leave it to the licensed, regulated municipal service to process my flushies into farming compost instead of collecting turds in a barrel.
I dont agree with your statement that drinking water is treated with nasty chemicals. I am a civil engineer, and we treat drinking water with one chemical and that is chlorine as a disinfectant. Which is proven to be safe. Most the contaminants are taken out of the water by letting bacteria eat the wastes, and then it is further filtered, settled and disinfected.
Although the whole system of using clean water to flush waste is, well wasteful. Grey water systems would be better and more sustainable. Where water is nto so widely available, they are using composting toilets. For instance, the group Engineers Without Borders, which i am a part of, has taken it upon themselves to design composting toilets for developing nations.
The need for a more sustainable system in the US is needed, but I think that using gray water would be easier, since the infrastructure is already set up for this at least in part. In addition, the waste from standard waste water treatment plants do go to compost, in many cases, so in effect it is still environmentally friendly.