Hello everyone, and happy new year.
I'm excited to start this year's series of podcasts with a conversation with my friend Arthur Davis, director of the Urine Nutrient Reclamation Project at the Rich Earth Institute and coordinator of Rich Earth’s new festival toilet business. Rich Earth uses human urine to create sustainable fertilizer for farmers. Long time listeners will have heard us talk about the Humanure system we use for our off-grid campuses, but Rich Earth has taken that philosophy and moved it to a community scale, and are the first in the US to do so. This not only means ecologically friendly fertilizer but far fewer waste nutrients in the local water supply. The work their doing is really fascinating and involves some really interesting chemistry. Talking with Arthur was a lot of fun, as he could easily communicate the concepts behind what Rich Earth is doing, as well as the day to day of an operation that collects urine on a community scale. We also touched on a few other sustainable waste management approaches, and how they influenced Arthur's interest in sustainability.
Links;
Rich Earth Institute
Living Machine Waste Water Systems
Humanure Handbook