Lighting the Kuthuvilakku
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The First
Urban Ecosan Workshop in the country was organised by
SCOPE in Trichy on November 6th, in collaboration with
WASTE of Netherlands and Stockholm Environment Institute
(SEI) Sweden.
Inaugurating the workshop Dr. M. Ponnavaikko, Vice Chancellor
of Bharathidasan University, said rapid urbanisation and
the attendant environment degradation, and increasing
water scarcity should make urban planners look for sustainable
systems, which can meet the requirements of the rising
population. It is time ecological sanitation (Ecosan)
technologies that offer a range of options for improving
urban sanitation were promoted in a big way.
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He called for measures to sensitise people, especially
those in urban areas, to the need Ecosan toilets which
were becoming popular in China, Europe, Africa, Central
America etc. where the problem of water scarcity looming
before the planet is being understood.
Delivering the keynote address, Dr. Arno Rosemarin,
Manager, Research and Communications, SEI, said a
large number of people were being infected with soil-transmitted
Helminths (worms), and nearly 700 million people in
50 countries were eating food infected with untreated
sewage. About 15,000 litres of water was used by a
flush toilet users though he produced only 50 litres
of faeces and 500 litres of urine a year. Sustainable
solutions were not being adopted to tackle the global
crisis. Sanitation planning was the key, and stakeholders
should be consulted before implementing it. SEI promoted
an Ecosan City in Dongsheng province in China where
dry toilet systems that use saw dust instead of water
have been installed in 830 apartments. Sanitation
paid for itself, as the benefits were worth 10 fold
the cost, he said.
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Dr. Arno Rosemarin Presenting
the Toilet to SCOPE
Mr. Valentin Post, Netherlands,
addressing the conference. |
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Presiding over the workshop Mr. M. Subburaman, Director
SCOPE, said it was a historic day in the sanitation
scenario of India, when experts from abroad, India
and planners from Trichy city had come together to
make a collective effort to answer the needs of sanitation,
health and hygiene and environmental sustainability
by 2015.
The world is today facing a major
problem, one of deteriorating quality of water, and
the other shortage of water and increased demand for
water from various sectors. In this context one has
to remember that the present toilet models consume
over 50 per cent of the water available and used by
us. It is in this global context that the concept
of ecosan was born.
In the 4th World Toilet Summit in
New Delhi held in the first week of November 2007,
top priority was given to Ecosan, which was suggested
as one very promising solution to improve the quality
of ground and surface water and reduce the quantity
of water needed for toilet usage .
Then came tsunami, and ecosan being
the best model for coastal area, over 1000 ecosan
toilets have been built, of them as many as 300 in
Kameswaram village of Nagapattinam District. BLESS,
CREED, MYRADA, Palmyra and other NGOs have been popularising
same in other districts.
The first ecosan chamber of the first
toilet of Mrs. Shanthi in tsunami hit coastal village
of Kameshwaram was opened by Mrs. Amudha, I.A.S.,
formerly of UNICEF and at present Collector, Dharmapuri
District. She has been a source of strength in all
our sanitation and ecosan ventures.
UNICEF appointed SCOPE as technical
consultant for dissemination of ecosan concept and
training of masons in all states of India, and so
far we have conducted programmes in six states.
SCOPE has been gaining more experience
in ecosan toilet. Urine and compost from ecosan toilets
are being used for agriculture and Tamil Nadu Agriculture
University has undertaken, two year research study
on this aspect.
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Participants Listening
the speech of Mr. Valentin Post.
Mr. Valentin Post, looking
at the compost in the opened chamber
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The Urban Scenario :
SCOPE who had gained some experience in ecosan toilet
models in rural areas has been planning to organise
an Urban Ecosan Workshop for past many months. The
urban Ecosan is different from rural Ecosan. It required
a very different approach, model, and close co-ordination
with Government agencies, and the people.
With growing urbanisation, demand for water in urban
areas will increase which means the amount of water
used in toilets too will go up. We have hence to work
fast, and also in a highly co-ordinated manner. The
challenge is to first change the mindset of people
by creating an awareness of the present world water
scenario, and how rapid increase of conventional toilet
models will add further to our problems.
Last month I had the good fortune
to attend the Fourth International Conference on “Sustainable
Sanitation in Dongsheng, in Erdos City, China”,
in this city a pioneer in the field of urban ecosan
a new district consisting of 825 ecosan toilets has
been, built with the technical guidance support of
SEI headed by Mr. Arno Rosemarin. He is with us today
along with two of his colleagues Ms. Cecilia Ruben,
SEI, Ms. Madeleine Fogde, SEI.
Mr. Valentin Post,
Desk Officer, WASTE, in his special address, highlighted
the need for reaching out to all sections to promote
the concept of ecosan which was the most environmental,
friendly model and helped reuse of urine and faeces
for promoting agricultural productivity.
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The owner of the Toilet
receiving the gift from Mr. Valentin Post.
The Board shows the
Dilution ratio of Urine and Water |
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Mr. S. Paramasivan: Country Director, Wherever There
is Need , (WTN), Pondicherry, stressed the need for
taking ecosan as holistic solution for prevention
of environmental and water source degradation, and
pointed out the defects of the present system of disposal
of human waste. He said that other toilet models were
polluting the soil, earth and water sources, and they
were not environmentally friendly.
Ecosan had much greater significance
in urban areas since due to a variety of reasons there
was steady migration of people from rural areas to
urban are, creating tremendous pressure on the existing
already over-burdened infra structure facilities.
Dr. Lucas Dengel : The need for adopting
new technologies to ensure sustainability of the environment
was highlighted by Dr. Lucas Dengel, of Auro Annam,
Aurovile. He said that in this context, he explained
use of Effective Micro-organism (E.M.) solution and
solid waste management, sanitation and health hygiene,
etc. He said that ecosan could be taken to urban areas
and for the support of research institutions was very
necessary.
Welcoming the gathering Mr. V. Ganapathy,
Liaison Officer, SCOPE, said the Ecosan was holistic
concept for sustainable sanitation which was economic
viable Avoided negative impact on environment and
minimised health risks. The workshop would prepare
a road map for promoting urban Ecosan.
A ceramic urban ecosan toilet model
in the multi-storeyed apartments in Erdos city China
was presented by Dr. Arno Rosemarin to the Director,
SCOPE.
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The Urine and Dilution
Tank
The Urine and Dilution
Tank
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Technical Session:
SCOPE has decided to form a working
group for promotion of Urban Ecosan in Trichy City,
as a follow up of the first Urban Workshop held in
Tiruchy. The working group consisting of experts from
various fields will take necessary steps based on
the recommendations the workshop.
Dr. Arno Rosemarin,
course Director, and Manager, Research and Communication
SEI, Sweden conducted the technical session assisted
by Ms. Cecilia Ruben and Ms. Madeline Fogde of SEI.
The urgent need for creating an awareness among the
Tiruchi citizens of the dangers posed to the city
by increased garbage generation, steep increase in
precious protected water used for toilet and bathing
purposes, and how ecosan cold help the citizens to
save water and use the nutrients in human waste for
improving environmental sustainability and farm production.
Mr.Valentin Post,
who presided said that it was quite clear that the
facilities available with the Tiruchy Corporation
was stressed to the maximum because of ever increasing
garbage generation on the one hand, reduced water
supply, irregular water supply, and inability of corporation
to get support of public for making city clean and
green, since sanitation and garbage management was
not their priority.
Mr. V. Ganapathy,
Liaison Officer, explained that the garbage-generated
daily was about 400 tones, and as much as 121 million
liters of water was going down as sewerage in the
underground system. There was no sludge treatment
facility in the compost yard of the corporation in
Panhcapur. About 30 percent of the city would not
have protected good water supply and sewerage system
even after the completion of current project being
implemented at a cost of about Rs. 160 crores.
Then there was an interaction between
the participants, the experts helped them to priorities
their programme for ecosan in a selected part of the
city, as a pilot model.
Mr. Anselm Rozario of MSSS,
Bangalore, Dr. Manivel, Department of Geography
and Remote Sensing, Bharathidasan University, Dr.
Raghuramadas Project co-coordinator, Mittraniketan,
Trivndrum, Dr. Lucas Dengel, Auroville, Mr. Vijayakumar,
Architect, Tiruchi, Prof. K Valliappan, of Tamilnadu
Agriculture University, Coimbatore, Dr. K. Parthasarathy,
IECD, BARD; Ms. Rimi Goswami, Project Officer, Arghyam,
Bangalore, Dr. M. Ravichandran, HOD, environmental
Science, BARD, Mr. Varun Ayyar, Krishnamoorthy Foundation
School, Adyar, Chennai, and others. took keen interest
in the discussions beside others.
Mr. Valentin Post and Dr.
Arno Rosemarin, by a series of questions
and comments to the participants, suggested that the
first step should be to define the area where the
pilot project could be initiated, the client, who
will undertake it (the stakeholders, the different
options and plans for funding the project, who shall
co-ordinate the activities of various departments,
and stakeholders. They also wanted opinion and policy
makers, media, industrial establishments, environmentalists,
educational and research organizations to be associated
with the planning of the pilot project.
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group formed : Mr. M. Subburaman
Dirctor SCOPE announced that a working group will
be formed for a pilot ecosan project in Tiruchi city
in Srirangam or Khajamalai area after further discussions
with the stakeholders. There will be network for urban
ecosan consisting of senior officials, NGOs, Educational
and research organisations, research scientists etc,
to promote the concept of ecoasan in urban areas at
the state level.
SCOPE will explore possibilities
of Urine diversion ecosan toilets in an educational
institution in Tiruchi.
The members of the working group will be:
1. Trichirappalli Corporation Officials
2. Engineers
3. Designers
4. Stakeholders
5. Mr. Siva Raman, Retired Chief Engineer.Trichy.
6. Professor Dr. Renganathan , Agriculture College.
7. Professor Dr. Ravichandran , Environment Department,
BARD
8. Dr. K. Parthasarathi, Director, IECD, BARD.
9. Mr. Theresnathan, Field Publicity Officer, Govt.
of India.
10. K. Subburaman, Youth co-ordinator, NYK.
11. Mr. R. Vijaya Raghavan Architect
12. Mr. Chandranesan Architect
13. K.G. Meenakshi – Correspondent Balalaya
School.
14. Ms. Sakunthala, FEDCOT
15. Mr. M. Subburaman, Director , SCOPE.
16. Mr. V.Ganapathy, Liaison officer, SCOPE
17. Mr. Ayoob, former AIR – Director.
18. Mrs. J. Geetha, Gramalaya.
19. Mr. Narayanan, Gramiyam.
20. Mr. K.M. Ratnam, AFDORP.
A Meeting of the working group for
piloting urban ecosan in Trichy city will be convened
shortly.
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Field
Visit : About 30 delegates
later took part in the field visit to Musiri, to know
hand how the user-families accepted the ecosan toilet,
and also know in detail the various features and usage
practices of ecosan toilets.
Dr. Arno Rosemarin opened the compost
chamber in the residence of Mrs. Veeramma Reddy. All
the delegates found that the compost had no smell,
handled it, and also asked many searching questions
to the family members, and their neighbours. They
also saw the first Ecosan Community Compost toilet
in Saliyar street, and learnt how it was working.
They showed keen interest in the various arrangements
made for collection of faeces, wash water and urine,
the usage of urine collected in the tank, how the
compost chamber size was arrive at, research activities
with urine by TNAU, who was in charge of operation
and maintenance, role of SHGs and Panchayat in the
maintenance of ECCT etc.
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