The sanitation concept ‘Blue Diversion’ (www.bluediversiontoilet.com) was developed as a possible answer to the sanitation crisis in urban slums. It is based on two main elements: (1) diversion of urine, feces, and water at the source as the basis for efficient resource recovery, and (2) linking different scales (family toilets and semi-centralized resource recovery). Our objective was to develop an attractive ‘grid-free’ (i.e. functioning without piped water, sewer, and electrical grid) dry urine-diverting toilet, which provides water (through recycling on-site) for flushing, personal hygiene (anal cleansing and menstrual hygiene), and hand washing. This service, including the entire sanitation value chain, should eventually be made available as a profitable business with total user fees of 5 ¢/p/d. The results presented in this paper are (1) a toilet design model, (2) the development of a new type of membrane bioreactor for treating flush and wash water, (3) main results of a geographic information system-based stochastic service model to link the family-scale toilet to a community-scale Resource Recovery Plant, and (4) a business model that yields maximum profit for the local community. We conclude that the approach is feasible, but challenging from a technical as well as an organizational point of view.
Skip Nav Destination
Article navigation
Research Article|
November 17 2014
Blue Diversion: a new approach to sanitation in informal settlements
Tove A. Larsen;
1Eawag, Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, 8600 Dübendorf, Switzerland
E-mail: tove.larsen@eawag.ch
Search for other works by this author on:
Heiko Gebauer;
Heiko Gebauer
1Eawag, Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, 8600 Dübendorf, Switzerland
Search for other works by this author on:
Harald Gründl;
Harald Gründl
2EOOS, Zelinkagasse 2/6, 1010 Vienna, Austria
Search for other works by this author on:
Rahel Künzle;
Rahel Künzle
1Eawag, Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, 8600 Dübendorf, Switzerland
Search for other works by this author on:
Christoph Lüthi;
Christoph Lüthi
1Eawag, Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, 8600 Dübendorf, Switzerland
Search for other works by this author on:
Ulrike Messmer;
Ulrike Messmer
1Eawag, Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, 8600 Dübendorf, Switzerland
Search for other works by this author on:
Eberhard Morgenroth;
Eberhard Morgenroth
1Eawag, Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, 8600 Dübendorf, Switzerland
3Institute of Environmental Engineering (IfU), ETH Zurich, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland
Search for other works by this author on:
Charles B. Niwagaba;
Charles B. Niwagaba
4Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Makerere University, P.O. Box 7062, Kampala, Uganda
Search for other works by this author on:
Bernhard Ranner
Bernhard Ranner
2EOOS, Zelinkagasse 2/6, 1010 Vienna, Austria
Search for other works by this author on:
Journal of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene for Development (2015) 5 (1): 64–71.
Article history
Received:
June 27 2014
Accepted:
September 19 2014
Citation
Tove A. Larsen, Heiko Gebauer, Harald Gründl, Rahel Künzle, Christoph Lüthi, Ulrike Messmer, Eberhard Morgenroth, Charles B. Niwagaba, Bernhard Ranner; Blue Diversion: a new approach to sanitation in informal settlements. Journal of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene for Development 1 March 2015; 5 (1): 64–71. doi: https://doi.org/10.2166/washdev.2014.115
Download citation file:
Sign in
Don't already have an account? Register
Client Account
You could not be signed in. Please check your email address / username and password and try again.
Could not validate captcha. Please try again.
Impact Factor 1.786
CiteScore 2.2 • Q2
38 days from submission to first decision on average