Every day, I pass the Elliott Bay Book Co. on my walk to work. Last year, for a period of time, I noticed in the window of the children's section that all the books on display were about poop. Some great titles like "Walter the Farting Dog", "Zombie Butts from Uranus" and "Poop: A Natural History of the Unmentionable". I know where poop comes from, but I know only a bit about where poop goes, in part thanks to my friend Dick Manning and his book "A Good House". As he so matter-of-factly points out: "As much of a third of the water used in our houses does not bathe us, it bathes shit. It is a curious habit, the ritual washing of feces." It's also a waste of energy and terrible for the environment.
My parade past poop at Elliott Bay got me curious to find out what was the latest on poop technology. I was especially interested in commercially viable ways to dispose of it without the use of water. Is there an end in sight to washing our crap? What I found was that there are lots of companies and organizations making money from turning other animal poop - elephant, cow, dog even worm - into energy or other products. But given the fact that we are 6 billion animals, and that water is only going to become more precious, where are the brave souls out there challenging the Western tradition of treating human poop with such dignity? Sadly, the number of self-composting, or dry, toilets on the market is pitiful, with Biolan, Biolet and Envirolet apparently the only ones who make enough money to advertise. Nor was I able to find any evidence of a company on the Internet that has a next generation waterless toilet technology, despite the fact that only one-sixth of the world's population is served by sewage systems. To my mind, that means a great market opportunity since there is no way we are going to be able to wash the poop of 5 billion more people. Other companies use air to literally blast the shit out of shit - compressed (pressure-assist), vacuum or displaced. But all use some water. Envirolet seems to get close with a combination of vacuum and compost that it calls vacuum flush (VF), but it still requires H2O. A newer company called Propelair, says its "displaced air" toilet uses 84% less water than a normal toilet, and at least made an attempt to make their toilet look cool, although its not actually available on the market yet. None of them seem particularly scaleable. All of this to say there is an opening to invest in new solutions. (NOTE: If there's a company out there that has a mass market cleantech toilet technology let me know because I want to buy one and I would love to promote your product to media and investors).