Rusted Sky

Don't I remember that the reason we quit using human waste as fertilizer was that it had too many germs in it and was making people sick when they ate crops grown with it. One of the shorts included on the "Disney Goes to War" was intended for export and existed specifically to warn farmers/farmhands not to defecate in the fields as they had been used to doing because it passed along disease.

Larry Niven kept talking about "friction-free" toilets; it made me think that perhaps using a teflon coating on a deeper-basined toilet (such as they use in Europe) might be able to save a lot of water, although not actually make it waterless.

You see this is where the Discovery Channel and Dirty Jobs is essential! Mike Rowe has been going through a number of municipal waste systems for sewage, storm sewers, and general garbage collection and we get a real 'feel' for what is going on with cities. Waste water is separated so that solids of non-metallic, non-plastic nature are moved for further processing and bio-breakdown until there are no germs left due to the heat they generate. Liquid components also go through multi-cycle anaerobic and aerobic processing so as to further reduce germ content and other harmful elements until what comes out is only a few percent worse in those department than what came in. Municipal water handling and sewage disposal are the #1 to reduce mortality human communities. The amazing thing from the Crete/Santorini finds from just before the eruption and to show the basis for the advanced civilization mentioned by Plato is that they did, indeed, have clean running water and sewage disposal piping that works on the same principles as ours for utilizing air flow to move the system along.

That said homes can have a used water system installed so that once used water is then recycled on a 'brown water' basis to toilets for secondary use to cut down on overall fluid use. Extra expense in retrofit and even original install on new homes makes that cost prohibitive as the payback is not seen within a few years based on water savings. For places with limited fresh water access, it is a good concept.

Third world areas need initial water processing and municiple waste handling and any place that lacks same is part of the third world by definition. Good and sound methods for ensuring water safety are extremely necessary and the major way to advance that is via low-water utilization agriculture. Part of the reason that farm land is turning into housing around Victor Davis Hanson is that the *water* is subsidized to farmers and even with that urban dwellers can pay more for it and thus get it. From that cropland and the techniques used in that area are then cheap and better utilized for those willing to pay more for water. If the farmers had changed to drip-based or dryland crops, their income would be steadier and their water utilization lower and the farmland would increase in value for agriculture.

When you hear folks decry the lack of fresh water for the third world you are hearing those scolding us for utilizing our resources and not hearing them address how those in those regions should better utilize theirs. From desalinization plants (which do cost money, heaven forbid) to large scale evaporation concepts (yes, water from condensate tends to be much cleaner than its source) to demineralization of deep aquifers... these are costly, yes. So how come these poor nations spend millions on arms and on baubles for kleptocrats and dictators?

You want good fertilizer from human waste? Best get a western style municiple water system in place. It works and works well. Clean, safe and efficient... once the dirty jobs are done...

Linda -

Yes, that was one of the reasons. Human/bovine waste isn't exactly something that - in the rawer forms - lends itself to easy and safe application as fertilizer.

True, it IS organic - but there's some pretty large drawbacks to using it.

J.

John C:

Well, if they make it, I might retrofit it... as long as it looks cool!

J.

Ajacksonian -

Third world areas need initial water processing and municiple waste handling and any place that lacks same is part of the third world by definition. ...

When you hear folks decry the lack of fresh water for the third world you are hearing those scolding us for utilizing our resources and not hearing them address how those in those regions should better utilize theirs. ...

So how come these poor nations spend millions on arms and on baubles for kleptocrats and dictators?

I shortened your comment a bit - hope you don't mind.

The reason why third world countries haven't gone for better sanitation is actually pretty simple. Guns and baubles are immediate and tangible. There's little to no waiting to get them. And when your term in office might be measured in weeks instead of years, you're not going to be thinking long-term.

Water plants and good sanitation take a long time to build, and their benefits are not immediately apparent. You have to be aware of the benefits, and willing to both spend for them and wait for them. Again, it's planning for the long term - and when your reign may be a short one, why spend on something that'll benefit your successor?

Not that it shouldn't be done, but it's hard to take the long view when the immediate future has too many variables.

J.

Is there any other natural resource either more recyclable or more recycled than water?

A gallon of water flushed down a toilet is not forever gone. Even without modern sewage treatment the natural water reclamation processes of evaporation and precipitation will, given time, recycle almost 100% of that gallon of dirty water into naturally pure water ready to be pumped into another city's water system and eventually to flow from somebody else's kitchen sink.

Every drop of water we drink today has passed through this cycle thousands of times.

otpu

Every drop of water has passed through millions of kidneys, whether they be bird, beast, fish, insect or man...

I remember a science book I once had that stated that every glass of water you drink had millions of molecules of water that Julius Ceasar had drunk. (And also, by extension, that he'd pissed out... but they didn't mention that) showing that water just kept going around and around and around...

But to the zero-sum environmentalist crowd, what's used in one place is not available in another AND NEVER WILL BE. So taking a drink of water in Michigan is depriving a poor person in Mumbai the chance to drink clean water.

But as you point out, John, it's not a zero-sum game. Only in the eyes of those who think that making sure everyone is equally miserable is the only way to go do you find the idea that everyone can have enough is completely unacceptable.

J.

J - No problem, I do go into verbose mode nearly all the time.

The arms, baubles and squads of thugs to enforce things are, actually, cheaper than infrastructure in the short run. In the long run it guarantees that a Nation nearly always have despots, tyrants, guns, baubles and thugs to enforce the will of the ruler and does not get a better standard of living for folks. That cannot be handed down, on high, in a Randy Barnett 'gap analysis' concept as the 'gap' is *not* achievement but in accountable government. The main difference between rich and poor Nations is not the end product of living standard, but the foundation of accountable government.

We have pushed 'realism' in foreign policy to the point that it no longer supports the idealism of the Nation. By brokering with every thug or tyrant we *like* we diminish the chances for liberty and freedom across the globe for all of mankind. As someone reported at Blackfive: AQ appears to be attacking Syria, who do we help?

The answer is: neither.

The 'enemy of my enemy' in this case is *also* our enemy, and so the prescription for 'red on red' conflict is ages old: watch it, make sure they don't come to any accord, pull up a chair and the popcorn. It feels so good to see enemies fight! And it is for *free*, no need to expend one, red US cent on determining if we like tyrannical despots or despotic tyrants. Side-wagers not included, of course...

It is not our job, as a Nation, to bring clean fresh drinking water or health care or any of those things to anyone outside our Nation. We can, however, teach them the method to get accountable government and do it for themselves. That is known as 'helping', not giving handouts to make one dependant upon handouts forevermore. The cure to not enough drinking water is *not* handing out unsustainable baubles, but in teaching that the best government is that which governs by common assent. We could use a bit more of that here as it seems to be heading towards irrelevence.