GTS Eco Friendly Toilets.

This is very relivent to the GTS potato project, as the two projects will be eventualy combined to use the composted waste from the Eco Toilets, to fertilize the potatoes enabling us to achieve the target crop of 20KG per barrel.

The major source of well water pollution in The Gambia is is not from natural causes, but  man made.

Unlike Europe where we have a complex system for processing human bodily waste, most Africans use either long drop toilets or flush toilets feeding a soak away pit. In either case because of the porous soil an area of eight meters deep and three meters radius (just over 225 cubic meters) is directly contaminated with untreated sewerage.

A well within twenty meters can be indirectly contaminated by water reaching it, from that area. It is such a problem that in towns such as Bakau, Serekunda and Banjul it is no longer possible to drink unboild water from any well.

To redress this problem we are in the process of developing eco friendly toilets, that will not only completly eliminate the possibility of untreated sewerage entering the underground water system, but also give valubal fertilizer for the potato project.

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This is a controlled project.

Full precautions will be taken to insure that no fertilizer is use in any way, until it has been fully composted.

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We have been given invaluable help and information from, Foot Prints Eco Lodge in The Gambia. When I first heard about the toilets  I was very sceptical. I imagined them to be little better that long drop toilets. But I couldn't have been further wrong. At Foot Prints they even have them in all their ensuite guest rooms, and they are absolutley fantastic.

                                      Compost toilet at Foot Prints Eco Lodge.

The GTS toilets will be made similar to the diagram below.

The toilet is divided into two seperate chambers. One chamber is used for six months, then sealed for six months to allow the contense to compost. During this time the second chamber is used.

To start the process about six inches of fresh saw dust is laid in the bottom of the first chamber. This is left for about two weeks, allowing the natrual composting process to begin. After which the toilet is used in the normal way, for both bodily functions, the only differance is that instead of flushing the solid waste and tiolet paper is covered with a small sprinkling of saw dust.

Nature takes care of everything, the only thing required is that occasionaly the pile of saw dust has to be pushed to one side, otherwise a pile developes in the middle making it hard the get the toilet lid down.

After six months use, the chamber is sealed leaving the composting process to continue, during this time the second chamber is used.

Because The Gambia is so hot, the human waste should be fully composted, when the chamber is empted, but if there is any doubt, it will be left for a further period before it is used on any food crops.

The sawdust holds solid waste, but any urine will filter to the bottom and flow out through the pipes shown in the diagram. The urine is diluted with waste water from the hand basin.

The end of the waste pipe is about half a meter underground, where it directley feeds Banana trees. These trees thrive on 'grey' waste, completley using it leaving no contamination at all.

In the diagram and you can see two pipes coming from the top of the chambers, they can also be seen on two of the photo's. These extend about two meters threw the top of the roof and are painted black. As the sun heats them up all the odeurs are sucked out of the chambers.

In The Gambia many people are blinded after getting bitten by mosquitoes coming from the long drop toilets. We are going to experiment with mosquitoe traps to add an extra benefit to the toilet. Mosquitoes are attracted to light, so they should be attracted to the light at the end of the venting pipes and fly to it. By putting mosquito nets over the top of the pipe, no mosquitoes will get in that way, but our misquitoes will be traped at the top. Providing that no light enters the chamber at night the mosquito will eventualy die and drop down, adding to the compost. We are very early in this part of the research, but others working on similar designs are getting very positive results.

There are 2,500 recognized species of mosquitoes. Female mosquitoes don’t bite—they feed—on your blood. That's because they need a blood meal to develop their eggs.
Males cannot suck blood because their mouthparts are not developed to pierce the human skin. They feed on nectar, honeydew and other plant juices.

It is therefore the adult female mosquitoes that are the trouble makers, because they suck blood, they are the ones that transmit human diseases including malaria, West Nile, yellow fever and dengue when the host is infected.
At the top of the list is malaria. This disease continues to rank as one of the most deadly diseases of man, killing somewhere around 3 million people per year, mostly in Africa and mostly children under 5.