In this post:
Water in the Anthropocene,
organisations ready to try new ideas
The commercial world is joining
Data that can support your idea and Online tools
Container Based Sanitation Services
Homebiogas – Bio-Toilet
…a list at the bottom of 7 posts on the subject of water-sanitation-toilets
#6 Online Tools
Water in the Anthropocene
“The world is your oyster. It’s up to you to find the pearl.”
A single oyster filters between 30 and 50 gallons of water each day by pumping water through its gills to eat. This process removes harmful nutrient pollutants like nitrogen, phosphorus, and carbon dioxide, improves water clarity, controls algae, and attracts other sea life. Oysters are keystone species, meaning other species largely depend on them, so their presence in an ecosystem is crucial for biodiversity within an estuary or coastline.
Yes, there are still Have-Nots.
At least 1/3 of the human population are Have-Nots.
The Have-Nots offer the best places to re-invent water-sanitation-toilets.
On the “sewers map” Africa, India and Asia still have the least amount of sewer pipes. This means less resistance to change. Less expense to experiment. Yes, many are in political conflict right now, but everyone needs a toilet. So, also great hope. These are the biggest laboratories left on planet Earth for re-inventing the toilets and the sewer systems.
The laboratory has extended its walls to the whole planet. Instruments are everywhere. Houses, factories, and hospitals have become lab outposts. Thanks to satellite networks, geologists and biologists can now take measurements outside their laboratories with the same degree of precision they achieve inside. Research satellites observe it from above, as if the Earth were under a microscope. The differences between natural history – outdoor science – and laboratory science is shrinking.
Give all ideas a chance. Try. If it fails, try to fix it, try something else…………. A million different directions and places that need sanitation, water. The new pioneers/innovators do not go into a wilderness to “break new ground”, they go into the communities of the Have-Nots and try their ideas based on what they find.
The world is our laboratory – what do you need to plan and try your ideas???
Where are your laboratory assistants (people and tools) and assistance (funding)?
Bernelle Verster
We as citizens and communities have an opportunity to create a water sensitive future for ourselves and the wider communities (including the environment) we are part of. Currently I am thinking about the most appropriate scales to implement these and at this early stage neighbourhood-level interventions seem particularly promising. Engage your local council constructively, have the discussions, try things out at small scale, get involved. Let’s work on a collective will to act. Let’s do all of this gently, kindly, with an ethic of care.
https://www.higherlifefoundation.com/
If we take another quick look at the conditions of the Have-Nots, you can find “a slice” that can offer small businesses a market with demand…..
Imagine if your only toilet is a hole in the ground, and it’s 50 meters away from your home, and it’s night, and it’s raining, and you have children or elderly grandparents who also need to “go”. …Are you all waiting for the rain to stop?
At least 1/3 are still Have-Nots. The people who…….
*Don’t have a decent toilet or clean drinkable water.
*Women and girls Spend Millions of hours every day finding a “safe” place outside anywhere to “go”, carrying water to their homes. Often in groups to prevent violence.
*Children going to school that have no toilets.
This does not have to be, with so many reasonable solutions near by.
With at least 1/3 of the world still Have-Nots.
Still big need = big demand.
We could leave it to the Water Mafia
In a grubby café in Karachi, Saghir Ahmed, a water tanker driver, explains how the mafias work. He says that he and other drivers routinely pay off officials from Karachi’s water board, the police and the “landlords” — men who own the land where the government pipes are punctured, and who build valves to allow the drivers to pump the water. Those valves, used to steal government water, are called “illegal hydrants.”
“The water board, police and landlord — these three — they benefit, they take the money,” he says.
Water kiosks
Public booths selling tap water, where water infrastructure is scarce.
Already there is a more efficient alternative: CityTaps.
“Our mission is to give people access to running water at home. Let us prevent the problems of Women and Girls who spend over 200 million hours fetching water every day and 443 million lost school days due to illness.”
This is a business supplying to a slice of the demand.
We see that there are cultural problems to over come with the flush toilet.
Many immigrants are learning about flush toilets and Western sanitary facilities for the first time. For good or bad.
Recommendations for building and using sanitary facilities in refugee accommodation In Germany, public buildings, homes and mobile sanitary facilities almost always have only sit-down toilets. If these buildings are made available to accommodate asylum seekers, damage, accidents, severe soiling of sanitary facilities and pipe blockages can occur because lack of experience and existing behavioural practices from their cultures.
Migrants from the Arab world who already live in Germany could be guides for others in how to use and take proper care of local sanitary facilities
There are so many people and organizations trying to fix these things that if a rich person decided to donate a little to each one, she/he might go broke.
#6 Online Tools
If you have a project, an idea to try, maybe one of these many organisations is the way to try it.
Water, Sanitation and Hygiene – WASH
WASH is everywhere
The WHO / UN’s WASH program and all the organizations that use it…
• UNICEF – Water, Sanitation and Hygiene
• The IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre
• The World Bank
• Water for Life UN-DESA
• WHO – Water, Sanitation & Health
• World Water Council
The Challenge seeks breakthroughs in the following three areas:
>>>Sanitation as a service:
>>>Financial mobilization:
>>>Capacity improvement of Cities and Towns:
In a Call to Action 21 September, 2016, the UN/World Bank High Level Panel on Water called for more innovation; a fundamental shift in the way the world looks at water. If you would like more information, please email [email protected] with “Urban Sanitation Challenge” in the subject line.
The Toilet Board Coalition (TBC) – The private sector – connecting large and small companies working with private, public and non-profit sectors to achieve “Sustainable Development Goal 6” (SDG6), universal access to sanitation.
The TBC runs the Toilet Accelerator, a programme dedicated to sanitation entrepreneurs in low-income markets. We look for commercially viable businesses – including innovative sanitary-ware infrastructure, products & service providers; toilet resource collection, treatment, and transformation to energy, nutrients, etc.; and digital applications for sanitation and preventative healthcare.
Toilet Accelerator Benefits
**12 months business support tailored to your challenges
**Partnership brokering & brand building – using TBC affiliate companies
**Access to capital – from TBC investor network, upon finishing the program successfully
**A business intelligence toolkit; including consumer, environmental and financial analyses
**On going membership to the Toilet Accelerator Programme
Over 1 year, 5 entrepreneurs/cohorts/companies partner with the TBC. Send in your application before 30 April to be part of the Accelerator starting in January of the following year.
What Informational Tools do you need to make your point? Data that can support your idea:
The WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) for Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene has reported country, regional and global estimates of progress on drinking water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) since 1990.
World Bank Open Data At the World Bank, the Development Data Group coordinates statistical and data work and maintains a number of macro, financial and sector databases. Working closely with the Bank’s regions and Global Practices, the group is guided by professional standards in the collection, compilation and dissemination of data to ensure that all data users can have confidence in the quality and integrity of the data produced.
ISCIENCES WORLDWIDE WATER WATCH
The Watch Lists are designed to provide seasonal forecasting of surface water anomalies (floods, droughts).
ISciences’ Water Security Indicator Model ( WSIM) produces monthly reports on current and forecasted global freshwater wet and dry periods with calculations of 1-9 months at 0.5°x0.5° resolution. Since April 2011, WSIM has proven reliable providing forecasts of emerging water security cares in that time-frame. WSIM has the ability to estimate the impacts of water anomalies on people, agriculture, and electricity generation. ISciences focuses on Water & Climate, Business Environment Exposure risks, Remote Sensing, and others.
UN Comtrade data A place to showcase innovative and experimental uses of UN Comtrade data. Explore visualizations of a huge volume of data and metadata, cutting-edge data extraction tools, and alternative dissemination platforms.
Google’s Tools, such as…..
Google Trends worldwide or by country
Google Scholar
OpenCorporates Search for companies by place or name.
UNICEF-WHO-World Bank for the Child – Resources by Topic and Country
The home of the U.S. Government’s open data
1000 GIS Applications & Uses – How and What Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are Changing the World
The Urban Observatory is an interactive exhibit that gives you the chance to compare and contrast maps of cities around the world–all from one location. Gathering City Data.
earth – a visualization of global weather conditions forecast by supercomputers updated every three hours This is an amazing picture of planet Earth in almost real time… click on the word “earth” in the left hand corner and then also in the bottom left hand corner click on “about” to see full information about the site and what you can see.
Reports and Online tools:
The “Baseline Water Stress” indicators, from the World Resources Institute’s Aqueduct Platform Tool (FREE to use) show chronic water stress. Aqueduct’s global water risk mapping tool helps companies, investors, governments, measure, map and understand water risks around the globe.
CLTS – Community Lead Total Sanitation – Innovations for Urban Sanitation
In response to calls from practitioners working with water, etc., this guide was developed to support Urban Community-Led Total Sanitation (U-CLTS) approaches. Although CLTS are already used, practitioners say practical steps involved are not clear. This book hopes to fill the gaps and increase awareness among urban WASH professionals about the potential of U-CLTS to improve different parts of the sanitation chain.
*Sustainable Sanitation and Water Management Toolbox is a FREE on line tool includes a section on Sanitation Systems and a web based university course. All of the course materials are available in the toolbox. An index of “water words”, lots of important elements that are involved
*SSWM Key Resources – is a list of other organisations with information and tools and info-assistance for anyone who wants to look.
*Take a look at their new “Safe Water Business Perspective” and find out more about market-based approaches for safe water! The factsheets of the Safe Water Business Perspective present validated tools and business models to start and scale up safe water business.
Compendium of Sanitation Systems and Technologies 2nd Edition
This second, revised edition of the Compendium presents a huge range of information on sanitation systems and technologies in one volume. With the order and structure of tried and tested technologies put into one concise document, the reader is provided with a useful planning tool for making informed decisions for a project. (also in the SSWM Toolbox.)
*If you follow this link, you will find the Compendium and Sanitation System Drawing Tool (FREE to use) ready to download and use, in at least 4 languages.
Do you know the value of your city’s sewage?
Our Resource Value Mapping (REVAMP) tool seeks to fill the gaps in information to help technology and Communities make wise decisions.
For Example: REVAMP was tested in Kampala, Uganda; a city of 1.5 million people, 90% of whom use on-site sanitation systems like pit latrines and septic tanks. Around 78% of Kampalans rely on firewood for their household energy needs, which is a major cause of deforestation in the area.
According to REVAMP calculations, nearly 100% of this firewood could be replaced with the fuel pellets made from the city’s faecal sludge, sewage sludge, and organic municipal solid waste.
Oct 18, 2018,
Dear Lesley,
Thank you for your interest in our work and specifically the REVAMP tool.
Yes, the tool is still in beta form and we are doing quite a bit of development work on it over the next few months before we release the first version that will be available publicly.
I agree that it would be of interest to the SMEs that your blog targets. Please keep an eye on our web page www.sei.org/revamp where all updates on the tool and its availability will be posted as we go along.
Regards,
Daniel Ddiba
Research Associate
[email protected]
On their website, under “Sector Financing”, the Sanitation and Water for All organization has a list of tools to help write proposals for water project funding and follow through with government authorities. Created in 2010, SWA is a partnership of governments and their development partners, including civil society, the private sector, donors, UN agencies, research and learning institutions.
International Reference Centre on Community Water Supply (IRC) and partners will host a symposium to continue to build and strengthen safe and sustainable WASH services.
12th – 14th March 2019, The Hague, the Netherlands
The WASHCost Calculator and its life-cycle costs approach is just one of many tools, projects and activities that the IRC offers to working with the systems involved in community water and sanitation.
– an Updated Beta version – ready to use.
Faecal Waste Flow Calculator Less easily measured issues such as government policies and legislation, available plans and budgets, respect for environment and safety standards are included using score cards.
#6 Online Tools
SuSanA provides policy advice, practical guidance and up to date knowledge about sustainable sanitation for all.
Organisations wanting to attract water and sanitation people often post job vacancies on the discussion forum.
The huge SuSanA Knowledge Hub includes a sanitation library, global project database, conference materials, information on sanitation events, audiovisual products. It also hosts one of the biggest discussion forums on sanitation-related topics, along with mini-sites for 13 SuSanA working groups and their activities.
SFDs
An excreta flow diagram, also described as a shit flow diagram (SFD), is a tool to readily understand and communicate how excreta physically flows through a city or town. The number of SFDs being prepared all over the world is increasing.
Yes, there is/was a World Toilet Organization
Sanitation Updates – a blog, originally set up to promote the 2008 International Year of Sanitation and continues to provide news, information and resources in support of the goal of sanitation for all.
So the Rush is on to “reinvent the big city flush toilet – water treatment system” >> “The Waste Water Rush”. Some kind of system that:
++ considers our growing human population,
++ saves enough drink-quality water for all,
++ uses the gold “waste” to put back on land!
Nothing is going to change the flush toilet overnight….
But people all over the place are working on it.
The companies in the Container-Based Sanitation Alliance look promising.
The Container Based Sanitation Alliance is a coalition of practitioners from around the world with a shared vision of a world where access to dignified, safe and affordable sanitation is no longer out of reach for families and communities in dense urban areas.
These are the companies and founders of the CBSA: Clean Team (Ghana), Loowatt (Madagascar), Sanivation and Sanergy (Kenya), and SOIL (Haiti). Groups affiliated with CBSA include Sanitation First (India), MoSan, re.source sanitation, Non-Water Sanitation and WSUP.
Find information about the alliance on their website …https://cbsa.global/
We are here to share knowledge and learning! GET IN TOUCH! email: [email protected]
What do we have here?
The smart Israeli’s have not prevented all their toilets from leaking, but wait! They are testing their own new ideas for change……….. This is a Waste Rush example of a small business that is growing…… Could this be scaled up to a city?
“We took our solution, the HomeBiogas 2.0, and thought about how we could use that existing technology for the important goal – safe and clean toilets for all.” Oshik Efrati said. “We researched today’s solutions and visited target populations in Africa and India.”
For a deeper understanding, Mr. Efrati even accompanied a woman who travels two kilometers, by foot daily into the wilderness to defecate.
“On the long walk there, she explained to me how unhygienic open defecation is, and that she and the other women sometimes fear for their safety, as they are vulnerable to any passerby late at night,” he said.
Simple “do-it-yourself assembly” makes it quick and easy to set up, “complete with assembly and maintenance instructions,” that do not require a technician to put it together.
The firm, employs 28 workers, was set up in 2012 and is based in a village in central Israel. The company already sells to customers in over 100 countries, and operates a network of more than 60 distributors.
What Can You Put into HomeBiogas?
I see liquid fertilizer, but what about the solid part of the waste?: The sludge that accumulates at the bottom of the digestion tank should be removed once every 5 years. The sludge can be applied directly as fertilizer.
“I can’t understand why people are frightened of new ideas. … I’m frightened of the old ones.”
― John Cage
#6 Online Tools
7 posts on the subject of water-sanitation-toilets, covering the following issues:
#1 Leaky toilets are everyone’s business!
#2 The beginning of Wasted Water.
#3 The natural way to empty our Bowels?
#4 We have 12 years to cool off planet Earth!
#5 Dry Toilet sanitation systems for our growing population
#6 Online Tools to Re-Invent with the Have-Nots.
#7 What is wrong with the Have’s? Plenty!
and two on a water Super Plant – Vetiver
Termite Eradication Naturally? …Ask WasteRush To Search
Vetiver System Proven I Say, “Heal The Land With Vetiver”