Challenges in Human Waste Management - Literature review Example

Introduction The disposal of human faucal waste is very important as it lack of proper disposal may have health and environmental consequences. The toilet plays a major role in the disposal of human faucal waste even though they may not be at the forefront of anthropological inquiry. In a thesis written in Britain about defecation, it was noted that it was a human aspect that was completely overlooked even though it is a universal biological function as it is taken as being uninteresting culturally; a similar view has also been reflected in the works of Loudon (1977), Longhurst (2001) and Inglis (2002). In some cases paying any attention to the toilet has been treated with high level of hostility; a typical example being the case where the call for papers on the topic was highly criticized where it was said that there was other important political issues that could be addressed. Challenges in human waste management With water being a highly precious global resource, human waste management is gaining an important position in daily politics. A good example is the case of Sydney sewerage system which was constructed in 1850s and drained its raw sewage directly it what currently is a famous harbor. Since then this has been the normal practice with all the drains that have been built in the city pointing seaward (Hawkins, 2006). There are numerous consequences that have come with this policy decision including: sewage being washed ashore, high concentration levels of faucal coliform, causing sickness in fish and swimmers. The use of water-heavy flush toilets and draining into the ocean is seen as a serious political issue in a water scarce island (Hawkins, 2006). The discussion of toilets, sewers and drainage in Sydney is interesting as its construction is specifically a public issue. POOO (Public Opposition to Ocean Outfalls) has offered many alternatives to the propositions by Water Board aimed at building outfalls further away from sea in 1989, none of which addressing domestic practice as none of them had the agenda of reforming the domestic disposal. In fact there has been a public outcry over imposing water restriction in 2003(Hawkins, 2006).. The public questioned the right which the state had over controlling the volume of water consumed in elimination of waste. On the other hand the drop-out type of toilet has been noted to lack the ability to protect their users from encountering their waste and the associated harm. The toilets are said to actively undermine the purified self. The construction of the self that is said to be private and purified does not emerge from nowhere and its link to the hidden linchpin of state-run sewers and supply of water to emerging of modern Western self is not an opinion of isolated few. The picture of changing in manners in Europe since the 16th century has clearly been presented by Norbert Elias in The Civilizing Process (1939), where there was a highlight of increased individualism, privacy and feeling shameful with regards bodily waste. He puts the argument that in Europe the management of what comes out of the body is central in individualism development. While Elias gives a broad account of changing manners in the entire Europe, with attitude only forming part, for Corbon (1986) an aromatic history of France is spelled out with much focus being on modernizing management of waste. Cordon also points out a simultaneous pattern of high level of individualism and privacy that surrounds space, health, human excretion and increase in intervention of state in people’s daily life. Personal water closets only become a reality by developing and connecting to sewers organized by the state. The expansion of individualism depends on the increase of state intruding in homes that are not distinguishable from power mechanism. With regards to reforming public heath in 19th century in Britain, attention has been directed towards morality as entwined in public health reforms development as observed by Poovey (1995) and Osborne (1996). Light has been identified in Morgan (2002) as being the means through which French; German and Anglo-Saxon toilets are distinguishable. Morgan’s work brings out the idea that it is not possible to isolate toilets from their material surrounding. Toilets have also been identified as a place there is imprinting of ideology upon the material world and that without ideology there is no utility. All matters concerning to toilets are linked the state even in a situation where sewer in non existent. Legislation on waste In Australia management of solids and liquid waste, which includes transportation, handling, storing, treatment and disposing, falls under EPA mandate. The body works closely with waste and recovery industry and other agencies in order to ensure that there is sustainable waste management practices, ensuring that wastage is low and encourage recovery of resources. Waste management has been transformed greatly, with the old way of landfill waste disposal being gradually eliminated and in its place being a new model aiming at avoiding waste production, reuse, recycling and recovering waste. This shift in waste management from landfills is consistent with the strategic plan of Australia that targets waste reduction by 25% by 2014 and is also aligned with implementation model in waste management. The objective of waste management in environmental protection policy of 2010 is to ensure sustainable waste management is achieved through application of waste management hierarchy in faith with principles developments that are ecologically sustainable as set out in environmental protection act of 1993. All these legislation are to be incorporated in human waste disposal. Ecologically Sustainable Design (ESD) solution The ecovillage may be the best solution of for ecological sustainability in human waste disposal with all resource requirements being with the boundaries and elimination effects on environment within the habitation are. The challenges in human waste disposal can be solved by adopting ecologically sustainable design (ESD). For ESD to have a future application potential, the activities are to be conducted in a closed system. This can be achieved in smallest activities but not in complex human habitation in biological system. On the other hand ESD is seen to be an ideal practice which is to be approached with the increasing knowledge on ecological systems and the need for keeping the human impact on the ecological system to minimal. Building of new dams, large sewage treatment plants and complex pipeline in an open system ideology on the quest of satisfying the increased human population does not make environmental, social or financial sense. The resources required in recovery systems for ECD need the minimum area for supporting the population and is required to provide mitigation against downstream development. In habitat with high scarcity of water, there is a great need to for water to be conserved. Focus at Household There is need to have solutions that are both environmentally and financially sound at a house hold level due to the fact that failure of costs and impacts at smallest unit of ecosystem, is a clear indicator that the system as a whole will fail. The principle of reduce; reuse and recycle (if necessary within a small geographical distance) work in multiple unit developments just as in modern solid waste management practice. The distance element comes in play in waste water situation because the cost of transportation of a product contributes a lot towards net energy cost on the consumer side and thus impacting on sustainability solution. Big, Bold and Costly Provision of large scale environmental solution is something that done in of places around the world. A typical example being the case of Rouse Lill Sewage Treatment Plant (STP) where there is utilization of modern techniques of affluent breakdown in order to achieve the desired standard before being released into several shallow ponds. After breakdown being undertaken for a considerable length of time, the affluent is then pumped back through STP where filtration and chlorination is done. The treated effluent is directed back to the houses in another pipe network. This results in an increase of cost for the well serviced system when compared with a similar sized blocks in the neighborhood. The cost per kilometer for recycled water does not differ much with that of potable water supply. Close coupling of STP has many advantages when applied to new housing development, but for the current case it could be that the journey travelled by effluent could have resulted in the recycling system infrastructure being beyond reach of most Councils as well as individual’s funding. Close Coupled Systems Having a more localized catchment management may be a solution towards saving a substantially on pipeline and pumping cost for the case of dense urban areas. The general of the thumb is that smaller reuse cycles geographically results into a more sustainable and less costly solution. Systems designed for household are found to be ideal in some respect owing to the individual responsibility being given to the house dweller in terms operation and use of backyard. Health risks have also been reported to be brought down in the case of a one-to-one relationship between the person’s construction the waste water and those utilizing the waste water for irrigation. A further argument is that surface spraying wastewater that is undisinfected maybe admissible if possibility of off-site runoff is eliminated. The mention of reuse of wastewater is usually in the context of treated recycled grey water. Grey water is majorly generated from bathrooms in addition to laundry. There is exclusion of kitchen waste water owing to its effect of clogging the pre-filters. The filters pay the role of educing the amount of lint and hair in the purification system. If left to pass to the pump, they will produce sludge forming deposits which will result into clogging the pump is the system. Addition of urine to the greywater at any stage of production is allowed; owing to its sterility property which is valuable to surface layers of a garden because of presence of high nitrogen levels. Bearing this in mind, it has been argued that peeing in the shower is much sensible as the urine will end up in the garden in contrast to using clean water in flushing the urine, which is a pure fertilizer, into contamination by feacal materials! in composting toilets it has been shown that urine will be broken to ammonia by micrococcus urea bacteria with the following disadvantages resulting from the breakdown: pungent smell of ammonia; the ammonia destroy the aerobic composting bacteria; there is loss of the valuable nitrogen fertilizer and the fertilizer which will remain are not balanced and thus not readily available to plants. 1 There has been evolution of this information this being attributed to Uppsala University of Sweden Prof. Mats Wolgast. A number of composting toilet options are found in Australia. All the toilets are equipped with a fan which help in establishing a draught in the toilet pedestal and eliminates bad smell in the toilet. Water Balance In water resource management there are two main aspects that are to be addressed in fulfilling environmental sustainability. The first issue being supplying clean potable water and second being disposing of nutrients that has found there way into the water on the process of use which make the water not fit for reuse. These challenges can sensibly be referred to as management of catchment and cycling of resources. In case there is any shortage in supply of potable water in local region then considering full ground disposal of contaminated wastewater may not be a viable option. It is in this respect that it we human waste is to be disposed at the same time avoid constant building of new dams with increasing population, there will be a great need of making best the water which has already been used in the houses. It is non-sensible putting focus on saving water inside homes at the same time poorly manage the wastewater that has been produced by the occupants of the homes as well as water required in keeping the associated gardens in good shape (with external use of water standing at 47% of the household water consumption). References Corbin, A. (1986) The Foul and the Fragrant: Odor and the French Social Imagination. Leamington Spa: Berg. Hawkins, G. (2006) The Ethics of Waste: How We Relate to Rubbish. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. Inglis, D. (2002) ‘Dirt and Denigration: The Faecal Imagery and Rhetorics of Abuse’, Postcolonial Studies 5(2): 207–21. Longhurst, R. (2001) Bodies: Exploring Fluid Boundaries. London: Routledge. Loudon, J. (1977) ‘On Body Products’, pp. 161–78 in J. Blacking (ed.) The Anthropology of the Body. London: Academic Press. Morgan, M. (2002) ‘The Plumbing of Modern Life’, Postcolonial Studies 5(2): 171–95. Osborne, T. (1996) ‘Security and Vitality: Drains, Liberalism and Power in the Nineteenth Century’,pp. 99–122 in A. Barry, T. Osborne and N. Rose (eds) Foucault and Political Reason. Chicago, IL:University of Chicago Press. Poovey, M. (1995) Making a Social Body. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Read More