5 ms·

Not sure how this is any better than a good composting toilet set up. Grew up with one in the house (hippy parents) and it doesn't smell and is minimal maintena

Not sure how this is any better than a good composting toilet set up. Grew up with one in the house (hippy parents) and it doesn't smell and is minimal maintenance. Not sure how well this would translate into an urban setting but that seems like a solvable problem (and a better approach than a subscription based service like this one). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Composting_toilet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Composting_toilet https://www.researchgate.net/publication/258852961_Composting_toilets_as_a_sustainable_alternative_to_urban_sanitation_-_A_review https://www.researchgate.net/publication/258852961_Compostin...

ams6110 9y ago
Looking at that Wikipedia page, the composting toilet sounds rather more complicated and expensive. Also potentially it does not destroy pathogens completely. The approach of the "Loowatt" keeps the residential installations simple, sanitary, and inexpensive, and locally centralizes the composting in a process that uses high heat to completely eliminate pathogens.
- schiffern 9y ago
  This. Sometimes decentralized solutions are great, but most people don't want to become experts at the sanitary biological processing of human waste (especially inside their own home). For safety and efficiency reasons it makes sense to aggregate that at the community scale. Think of it like the local sewage treatment plant. Actually it's better than a conventional sewage treatment plant, because * it safely recycles fertility (interrupting the fecal-oral route, unlike "night soil"), providing a sustainable alternative to phosphorus mining and other fossil fertilizers * it doesn't discharge fertilizer into waterways where it causes eutrophication and "dead zones" * it produces biogas energy rather than being a large energy consumer * it doesn't squander potable water to transport human waste, and * it doesn't require a huge network of underground pipes, which have enormous embodied energy and replacement cost. If your city can't afford to replace the underground pipes, your water system is insecure and unsustainable for that reason alone. Here's another large scale biogas digestor operation (this one's for food waste): https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/15/magazine/the-compost-king-of-new-york.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/15/magazine/the-compost-king...
- danisth 9y ago
  Yeah those are good points. Also I realized that we have a "subscription service" with indoor plumbing through paying for water. There's no reason something like this couldn't be paid for through a tax which would encourage wide scale adoption.
gumby 9y ago
The article mentions the water table as a problem.

ams6110 9y ago

Looking at that Wikipedia page, the composting toilet sounds rather more complicated and expensive. Also potentially it does not destroy pathogens completely. The approach of the "Loowatt" keeps the residential installations simple, sanitary, and inexpensive, and locally centralizes the composting in a process that uses high heat to completely eliminate pathogens.

schiffern 9y ago
This. Sometimes decentralized solutions are great, but most people don't want to become experts at the sanitary biological processing of human waste (especially inside their own home). For safety and efficiency reasons it makes sense to aggregate that at the community scale. Think of it like the local sewage treatment plant. Actually it's better than a conventional sewage treatment plant, because * it safely recycles fertility (interrupting the fecal-oral route, unlike "night soil"), providing a sustainable alternative to phosphorus mining and other fossil fertilizers * it doesn't discharge fertilizer into waterways where it causes eutrophication and "dead zones" * it produces biogas energy rather than being a large energy consumer * it doesn't squander potable water to transport human waste, and * it doesn't require a huge network of underground pipes, which have enormous embodied energy and replacement cost. If your city can't afford to replace the underground pipes, your water system is insecure and unsustainable for that reason alone. Here's another large scale biogas digestor operation (this one's for food waste): https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/15/magazine/the-compost-king-of-new-york.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/15/magazine/the-compost-king...
danisth 9y ago
Yeah those are good points. Also I realized that we have a "subscription service" with indoor plumbing through paying for water. There's no reason something like this couldn't be paid for through a tax which would encourage wide scale adoption.

gumby 9y ago

The article mentions the water table as a problem.