| Abstract |
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Sanitation is a term which includes safe disposal of human waste, waste-water management, solid waste management, water supply, control of vectors of diseases, domestic and personal hygiene, and hygiene maintenance in food and housing. Lack of toilets puts India’s health and rural people’s safety at risk. Open defecation is still in practice in many rural areas resulting in serious social, health, economic and environmental problems. Openly lying human waste enables breeding and transmission of pathogens, which carry diseases and infections. The problem is most acute for children, women, and young girls. Children, especially those under the age of five are most prone to diarrhoea and sometimes even lose their lives to an easily preventable disease. Reusable Water Flush system in Urine-Diverting Dry Toilet (UDDT) is built such that urine is drained from the front area of the toilet and collected in a tank while faeces fall through a large hole in a separate tank. The collected urine is mixed with sand and bacteria to produce bricks like fire clay bricks. The human excreta should be treated with the sun’s heat to kill the pathogens and then mix the product with waste materials such as charcoal, dust or sawdust. Faeces have a high fibre content, so when cooled and dried after heat treatment, a hard and solid briquette forms which do not look or smell like human excreta. The briquettes burn just like charcoal but they do not produce any harmful effects to the environment. They can be used to boil water and power turbines to generate electricity. The water used for flushing can be recycled and used again for flushing. |
