Close Menu
    How poop could help feed the planet
    Futurology

    How poop could help feed the planet

    Share.
    View 13 Comments

    13 Comments

    1. techreview on

      A new industrial facility in suburban Seattle is giving off a whiff of futuristic technology. It can safely treat fecal waste from people and livestock while recycling nutrients that are crucial for agriculture but in increasingly short supply across the nation’s farmlands. 

      Within the 2.3-acre plant, which smells lightly of ammonia, giant rotating spindles turn steaming-hot septic sludge and biosolids from local wastewater treatment plants into what an engineer calls “poop crepes.” Giant scrapers then deposit the baked biomatter onto a combination conveyor belt and dryer to yield a growing pile of sterilized fertilizer. The waste-­processing method uses compressed steam generated in an earlier step, cutting the electricity needed by 95%. Besides the dry fertilizer, the process yields nearly pure ammonia and water. 

      This system, called Varcor, was designed by the Seattle engineering firm Sedron Technologies and is owned by the San Francisco–based company Generate Upcycle. Wastewater treatment plants across the country are using high heat, composting, and devices akin to pressure cookers to transform leftover biomass into rich fertilizers, mulches, and other soil additives with names like Bloom and TAGRO (short for “Tacoma Grow”). Some process the wastewater in a separate step to extract phosphorus—an essential plant nutrient and a common element in the human diet—and layer it to form round pellets, in a technique a bit like building pearls. This technology, developed by a St. Louis–based company called Ostara, creates a slow-release fertilizer that can be sold back to farmers. 

    2. quigongene on

      Austin: Cor! This coffee smells like shit!

      Basil: It is shit, Austin.

      Austin: Oh, good. Then it’s not just me.

      Austin: It’s a bit nutty.

    3. ButtlessFucknut on

      “We here at Snowpiercer Foods have worked hard to develop high quality food products with only the best locally sourced ingredients available today.”

    4. North_Ad_4450 on

      This level of recycling is essential for future resource needs. My concern, which i do not see addressed, is how to handle contaminants. PFAS in toilet paper as well as excreted pharmaceuticals and inorganic toxins. I have heard of past cases where practices like this have polluted farm lands.

    5. fart_huffington on

      They should probably add a step to remove heavy metals, persistent pharmaceuticals etc.

    10. ashoka_akira on

      They keep trying to send this stuff up to BC, but no one wants the bio solids, local indigenous groups in my area actually have long standing blockades on roads leading through their legal territories and they turn around any trucks suspected of shipping this crap.

    11. ZenithBlade101 on

      >Besides the dry fertilizer, the process yields nearly pure ammonia and water. 

      You vill drink ze poop water and live in ze pod…

      Jokes aside tho, this resource extraction method doesn’t seem like a bad idea

    12. jareddeity on

      A friend of mine did her dissertation for something similar, was a very cool read. However, if i remember correctly, the yield of usable materials left over (mostly nitrogen i believe) was something in the 20ish percentage and was not economical enough for companies to produce on scale, that is if it was even scalable.