DRYCLOSET · New biocide dry toilet with improved hygienic functionalities

Water is essential for life. This element supposes also a determinant factor in the economy and ecology of the different regions. But water not only has influence in the human life, humans also affect to water cycle. The human activity is responsible of the climate change by which the Mediterranean region is being affected by drought and water shortage. Water shortage in Mediterranea countries is becoming an essential question. The domestic sector accounted for about 24 percent of total water withdrawn in Europe in 2000, which is about 7,320,00ML. In fact, toilet flushing supposes 30% of the domestic use of urban water. The consume of such amount of water could be avoided using dry toilets, it is calculated saving of 50L/cap/day. In addition, it is estimated more than 20 million citizens without access to a safe sanitation in Europe. This situation is critical in rural areas of eastern European, where the most common system in these areas usually consist of pit latrines and septic tanks. Dry toilets are common in Nordic countries but their rustic technology makes them unacceptable in urban or large communities. At present dry toilets implies several factors, such as unpleasant odours and the manual manipulation of the latrine waste, which makes them unviable in most of urban environments. Also, there are other problems of drytoilets such as struvite formation on pipe connections. But this situation can be changed by applying the technical innovations that will be developed in this project. In adittion, the project’s success will allow the possibility to save important drinking water (1,875L/cap/year). This will be of essential importance in the Mediterranean countries, where the drought menace is each time more obvious. The use of dry toilets in rural areas with poor infrastructure will have safe sanitation systems to citizens DRYCLOSET project will develop a new dry toilet with a biocide toilet, low bad odours emissions and low maintenance.