They invested $41.5 million dollars to develop this new technology, and they affirm that this can revolutionize the way that billions of people live today. According to their foundation 2.6 billion people today don’t have a sewer system, and in consequence of that they have to poop in open areas, what often develop diseases and affect the health of many people.
According to the website www.fastcompany.com there are four groups doing four different projects:
“One Gates Foundation-funded project will build toilets that transform feces into charcoal. A team led by Loughborough University's M. Khan is developing a toilet that could safely turn human waste into charcoal, salt, and clean water. The toilets transform feces into usable fuel through “a process combining hydrothermal carbonization of fecal sludge followed by combustion." Most importantly, the toilets don't need to be connected to the electric grid or a generator for the process--they are instead powered by the heat generated through the fecal combustion itself. As a side effect, the generators also recover usable water and salt from bodily waste.”
“Another super-toilet being built by a Dutch team can generate electricity from bodily functions. The Delft University of Technology's Georgios D. Stefanidis is leading a groupwhose toilet generates electricity when in use. These toilets use custom-made microwave technology to gasify human waste into plasma, which yields syngas--a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen. Syngas can then be fed into a fuel cell stack for energy generation. Enough electricity could hypothetically be generated by a single toilet to serve multiple households.”
“Or how about a toilet that can give a village an entire human-waste-charcoal production plant? Brian Von Herzen of the Climate Foundation and Stanford University's Reginald E. Mitchell are building a prototype community-scale charcoal production plant in Kenya that can process two tons of human bodily waste daily. The self-contained system will transform human waste into a type of charcoal called biochar through decomposition at high temperatures without oxygen. However, biochar can't be used as a fuel source--it is instead used for agricultural purposes.”
“Another toilet will be able to repower hydrogen fuel cells through fecal matter. Michael R. Hoffmann of Caltech and his team have proposed a solar-powered toilet that uses sunlight to power a small reactor that breaks down urine and feces into hydrogen gas. This hydrogen gas can then be stored in hydrogen fuel cells to provide a backup energy source.”
Watch the video (that is very straight forward by the way) for more information:
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