Container-based sanitation
With suitable development, support and functioning partnerships, CBS can be used to provide low-income urban populations with safe collection, transport and treatment of excrement at a lower cost than installing and maintaining sewers.
[1][3] This includes densely-populated urban neighborhoods, informal settlements, areas with high water tables, or where there is risk of frequent flooding.
[2] A study by Worldbank published in 2019 states that CBS emerged as an alternative service approach for the urban poor in about 2009.
Excreta-filled containers are sealed and transported by container-based sanitation service providers to a designated treatment or disposal site.
Like pay-per-use public toilets, household subscription container-based sanitation services enable customers to discontinue usage if they so choose.
People do not come into contact with waste throughout the entire service chain of containment, emptying, transportation, treatment and disposal or reuse.
Proponents also note that users have more freedom of choice in that container-based toilets are portable and customers could choose another service provider.
Resource recovery from human waste collected by a container-based sanitation system is comparatively easier to convert into energy, animal feed or soil amendments.
[8] Others options are conversion to uncarbonized and carbonized biomass fuel, using black soldier fly larvae to produce protein-rich animal feed, and anaerobic digestion for biogas production.
Other applications can include areas where:[3]: 38 In 2017 at the Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya, the container-based sanitation system run by Sanivation was shown to be cheaper than pit latrines, given the costs associated with installation and frequent de-sludging.
Although container-based sanitation systems have shown considerable potential for cost recovery through service fees and sales of final products, the need to continue experimenting and identifying the right elements for business models and public financing remain.
Some service providers are currently working together with local government partners to conduct World Health Organization Sanitation Safety Planning, which is a modular risk assessment process used to systematically understand and mitigate health-related hazards for each link of the sanitation chain.
The Container-Based Sanitation Alliance was formed in November 2016 to share information on "best practices" and collaborate on building industry standards of safety.
The basic concept of the container-based sanitation system is being applied by various organizations and businesses around the world, differentiated mainly by the types of toilet interface used, financing models, and reuse or disposal methods.
Clean Team is a social enterprise providing safe, affordable in-home container-based sanitation toilets for low-income families in Kumasi, Ghana.
[14] Clean Team transports the waste and ensures its safe disposal and treatment at a processing center owned by Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly.
Sanergy is a social enterprise making safe sanitation accessible and affordable in Africa's urban informal settlements where there are no sewer connections.
[16] Sanergy's approach to solving the sanitation crisis involves five key steps: building a network of container-based sanitation franchises offering affordable "Fresh Life Toilets"; supporting its operating partners with access to finance, training, and marketing; collecting the waste regularly and safely removing it from the community; converting the waste into valuable end products, such as organic fertilizer, insect-based animal feed, and renewable energy; and selling the end products to Kenyan farms.
Underneath, containers separately receive the three types of excreta: feces, urine, and anal wash water.
As of November 2017 some 5,000 people were daily using these kinds of toilets in the Union Territory of Puducherry and Cuddalore, in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu.
The non-profit organization SOIL was established in Haiti in 2006, providing affordable household container-based sanitation services in some of the world's poorest communities.
Revenue from monthly user fees and compost sales are used to cover a part of the ongoing service costs.
[18] Sanivation is a social enterprise based in Kenya that partners with institutions to turn feces into a sustainable fuel.
The comprehensive systemic solution improves health conditions, protects the environment and water sources, while creating local business opportunities.
