Dear Christoph,
thanks for your comments, and sorry for this a bit late reply.
But yes, you are right, most of the schools I visited had still some problems with their UDDTs, mainly with managing maintenance practice, even though they were motivated and liked the dry toilets, but the question was more often about lacking resources such as finance or know-how. And, as you mentioned, it is challenging to maintain any kind of toilets in public institutions…
Unfortunately I didn’t have a closer look inside the blocked urine pipes, but most likely it was a question of misuse, and convection of ash in the urine pipes (not struvite, but I’m not sure).
I hope I answered to your question.
Kirsikka

Urine mixing concentration.
The dilution of the urine depends on various factors such as: the ambient and soil temperature, soil conditions (sand, loam or clay), shading or partial shading (greenhouse), the humidity level of the air including altitude above sea-level, the growing phase of the plants, the amount of leaves the plant has, and the period before the plant is going to be harvested.
The above means that you cannot fix a rate, but need to establish the dilution according to the agricultural zone and climate conditions.
Practically it means that local agricultural stations and farmers need to run test areas and compute the results.
Based on those figures advisory charts can be developed for the most common plants grown in the area and season.
Please see the short not attached.

Dear Nosipho

Welcome to the SuSanA discussion forum.

See above in Elisabeth's post for the link to the SuSanA library where a copy of Kirsikka's thesis is uploaded. The MSc thesis is here: www.susana.org/lang-en/library?view=ccbk...p;type=2&id=1581

In addition could you please also introduce yourself Nosipho and tell us a little about what you are studying in your Masters and also more about your project on UD toilets.

Have you for instance seen the case study on "Large-scale peri-urban and rural sanitation with UDDTs, eThekwini Municipality (Durban), South Africa" here is the link for your convenience: www.susana.org/lang-en/library?view=ccbktypeitem&type=2&id=791

Perhaps that could be useful for your project.
Kind regards
Trevor

Hi Kirsikka

I hope this finds you well. Thank you for sharing such a wonderful work with us. I am a masters student in South Africa and my project is on UD toilets and I would really appreciate it if I could have access to your paper, I am sure I WILL learn a lot from it.

Regards
Nosipho

Hello Kirsikka,
just some questions about your paper which is very interesting.
Please correct me if I´m wrong. I took from your paper the following conclusion:
All your main conclusions besides one do apply more or less to every school toilet project as a problem, not only to UDDT: low number of spots available, maintenance, hand washing, high motivation to maintain by the pupils and teacher and school stuff (schools with reuse are higher motivated to maintain). Therefore these problems have to be delt with as in every school toilet project.
The major difference is the aspect of urine pipe blocking. That is absolutely crucial and totally technology dependent, therefore I would make some questions. Could you comment on the diameter, gradient and if there are 90° bendings and if it is struvite blocking or just by wrong use? It would be nice to know to what extent the blocking is driven by construction /design, or user habits or regular maintenance aspects (ash, feces blocking urine). We did some school installations some years ago and up to now never had struvite problems, blockings where always related to misuse, but we do 50 mm urine pipes and a very steep slope (out of fear ). In total we have some reservations about UDDT school projects because it is so crucial to have good maintenance and that is not easy to have in public spaces. And easily failure can be attributed to UDDT instead of the common problem of maintenance in public toilets.
Thanks for sharing the paper.
Christoph

Thanks Elisabeth for reminding me to do some updates also here!

So, dear all,
finally I've completed my thesis (and also graduated!). One major conclusion of my study is that the main driving factors and motivation for the schools to maintain their UDDTs are the benefits and success gained from them. For example more comfortable and odorless toilets, less polluted environment, fertilizers (urine and faeces) and economic benefits are considered as success factors that lead to motivation and continuity. You can read further analyzing in the full paper:




I'm happy I had the chance to present my study at the 4th International Dry Toilet Conference last week.

I want to thank everyone who were helping me in the thesis project and I hope we'll have opportunity to work together with this important topic of sustainable sanitation also in the future.

Kiitos,
Kirsikka

Dear all,

You might have wondered what exactly came out of Kirsikka's research work at the end - since she posted about it here earlier in the year.

Well, here is her completed MSc thesis now:
www.susana.org/lang-en/library?view=ccbktypeitem&type=2&id=1581

I have copied her abstract further down below.
If you don't have time to read her thesis (who has time to read big documents these days...), there is now also an 8-page conference paper about it available: she will present it this week at the Dry Toilet Conference in Finland. If you happen to be there, do approach her and have a chat with her. I hope that after the conference, all papers and presentations will be made available online (and also find their way into the SuSanA library).

I think she did a very nice piece of work for a Masters thesis. I am glad we were able to support her by hooking her up with the very capable consultants Moses and Whycliffe in Kenya who worked with GIZ in the EPP until 2009 and are now ecosan consultants in Kenya.


+++++++++++

Ecosan in schools: post-evaluation of the operation of urine diverting dry toilets in rural schools in Kenya - Factors affecting their sustainability

The Ecosan Promotion Project (EPP) in Kenya, funded by EU, GTZ and Sida, was promoting appropriate ecological sanitation (ecosan) technologies during the project period (2006-2010). Urine Diversion Dry Toilets (UDDTs) were built in 73 primary and secondary schools throughout Kenya with four units in each school.

The purpose of the research in question was to monitor and post-evaluate UDDTs implemented by the EPP, two years after the constructions. In November 2011 and January 2012 five schools were visited and evaluated in southern Nyanza province and five in Western province in Kenya. The schools were pre-evaluated and selected for this research on the basis of their good performance in operation and maintenance (O&M) of their UDDTs.

The constructions of the UDDTs were financed by EPP but maintenance is organized and funded by the schools themselves. Generally a common problem for sanitation projects is poor long term maintenance of the facilities, after the donor funding for construction and initial training has ended.

Monitoring and post-evaluation of the UDDTs focused on how the facilities are being managed and used. Methods for this were on-site observations, interviews and discussions together with teachers, pupils and caretakers. The research objective was to determine the reasons for the good practice, but also to identify the problems and reflect the results to improve O&M systems in the future. One major problem observed was gradual or sudden disappearance of the initial motivation and knowledge from the school, often when the person in charge of sanitation left the school.

According to the results of this research, an important factor motivating the schools to keep their UDDT facilities clean and in good condition, were the actual bene-fits received from the sanitation systems such as clean and comfortable toilet facilities, healthier environment, e.g. very low risk for ground water pollution and spreading of pathogens into the surroundings, saved space on the school yard as UDDTs can last long at the same spot, and possibility to use the UDDT products either as fertilizers or soil conditioner. These benefits and good results lead to motivation and deeper engagement and to continuity. Especially utilization of UDDT products indicates that the concept of ecological sanitation and technology of UDDTs have been accepted.

+++++++

Regards
Elisabeth

Hi Chris!
I just uploaded two sets of my photos to SuSanA flickr photo database, you can see the UDDTs I was evaluating here (I have pics of both well and poorly maintained toilets):

www.flickr.com/photos/gtzecosan/sets/72157629413395685/

www.flickr.com/photos/gtzecosan/sets/72157629399616383/

Cheers,
Kirsikka

One example (see more on the links above):

UDDTs. Mumias Muslim Primary School. by Sustainable sanitation , on Flickr

Hi Kirsikka. By Concentrated urine, I mean non water added to it. The ratio of 1:1 has worked for so many people here in Western especially in Mumias and Bungoma during fertilizer application with urine. During heavy rains, we dont use any water at all.

Hi Kirsikka,

I am glad to know that the users are happy with their UDDTs. It would be nice to know more about the design features of these successful UDDTs, so photos of the actual toilet would be helpful. Is it for squatting or for sitting? Washing or wiping?

Why does the unit you show have a little side room, with a separate door?

Best wishes,
Chris Canaday

Hello!
Some weeks ago we visited few household UDDTs (built during Ecosan Promotion Project) in Western Province, Kenya. Toilets were very clean and well maintained. Of course it's a lot easier to operate and maintain toilets at individual level, compared to bigger units and institutions e.g. schools, but well managed household UDDTs are a very good thing in communities for absorbing and spreading the principles of ecological sanitation and especially reuse of ecosan products. Owners were pleased with their UDDTs and reused urine as fertilizer in agriculture.


[Household UDDT in Chwele, Western Kenya. In the front a farm where urine-water mixture is utilized with good results.]

Dear Moses,
what do you mean with concentrated urine? Pure urine? Mixing ratio 1:1 already sounds quite strong especially during the dry season, doesn't it..?