https://archersmushrooms.co.uk/matt-smalls-blue-barrel-fermentation-tek/
https://ubyssey.ca/science/mycotoilet/
https://livingarchitectureslab.squarespace.com/work/wildlife-99m9p
https://indiebio.co.za/growing-fungal-mycelium-on-faeces/
If dry toilets, or very low flush, decentralized toilets are to be a viable water sensitive, sustainable sanitation option, and more so, to be considered as the top of the sanitation ladder, it needs to be acceptable to the user at all income levels, and easy to process and transport the material. Further, the produced material needs to contribute to the Sanitation Economy. From the infrastructure perspective the transport and processing of faecal sludge is a challenge. Faecal sludge management is not functioning well, with few private sector sanitation service providers (Holm et al, 2018). And personally, emptying the bucket is the only thing I don’t like about my dry toilet. If the faecal sludge is safe, easy to remove and not smelly, then the private sector may be more willing to manage it to contribute to service delivery and creating value from waste.
An Industrial Design Masters project on the Susana forum used fungal mycelium in a ‘PooPac’ liner to absorb odour and liquid of faeces in containers. It was a potential application of using fungi in-situ, but as a visual design project was done without any processing knowledge, the mycelium was not produced from the faeces itself, and the range of operating conditions was not investigated.
Separately, fungi is gaining interest globally:
- Fungi are nature’s decomposers, and to access as much of the planet’s organic energy as possible, fungi have gotten really, really good at breaking down just about everything. This Gizmodo article explores the opportunities that presents, from healthy soils to degrading plastic and more.
- University of Washington Bothell investigating the ability of mushroom mycelium to reduce faecal coliform bacteria contamination in surface water
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