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Composting Toilets. Clarification Please


Clodi

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1 minute ago, Jerra said:

The point I was making is if spreading raw sewage is illegal is not a little strange that farmers can spread raw slurry.

Human waste contains many drugs and pathogens which are not in animal slurry.

 

Even treated sewage sludge is limited in the amount that can be used - it must also be tested by the waste authority and 'cleared' for use on the land.

 

The negatives of using TREATED SEWAGE SLUDGE (extract from Monkey's Link)

 

The negatives are it can contain potentially toxic elements (PTEs) which are a risk to human, plant and animal health.

PTEs include elements such as zinc, cadmium, mercury, chromium, selenium and arsenic.

Sludge may also contain virus and disease-causing pathogens including salmonellae, beef tapeworm eggs and potato cysts nematodes.

 

All sorts of nasties can leach out of sewage and sewage sludge and leach into waterways :

 

Britain faces a £30bn bill to clean up rivers, streams and drinking water supplies contaminated by synthetic hormones from contraceptive pills. Drastic reductions in these chemicals, which have been linked to collapses in fish populations, are proposed in the latest European Union water framework directive.

But the plan, which would involve upgrading the sewage network and significantly increasing household water bills, is controversial. Water and pharmaceutical companies dispute the science involved and argue the costs are prohibitive. By contrast, many environmental researchers say the proposal is sound.

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6 minutes ago, LadyG said:

I know exctly what you meant.

Briefly, human waste is more likely to be contaminated with human pathogens and heavy metals than cow slurry.

 Cows are vegetarian and the  E Coli  in their intestines is less likely to be of the human type, less likely to spread human disease.

I was wondering if the diet played a part, I will, if not exactly happily, shovel horse and cow muck but my reaction to dog and human is certainly not so relaxed 

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6 hours ago, LadyG said:

FYI London Boat Girl is not enamoured, she's sold the composting loo

Youtube:  Why I Got Rid of My Composting Toilet

some folks might find this yukky! GROSS!!!! There are some BAD words and some more GROSSNESS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I had a look at her video.

 

She says 1  it was not the right model for her

                 2  it was not installed properly

                 3  she did not use it correctly

                 4  a major reason for selling it was that she needed the money for something else   

                5  another reason is that a 3rd party will be using the boat extensively and the pump-out will be easier for them to d/w

        

 

I got the impression that she was fairy enamoured but that her particular circumstances were not right.

 

LBG is a master of 'bad words' - I like it.

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9 hours ago, frahkn said:

I had a look at her video.

 

She says 1  it was not the right model for her

                 2  it was not installed properly

                 3  she did not use it correctly

                 4  a major reason for selling it was that she needed the money for something else   

                5  another reason is that a 3rd party will be using the boat extensively and the pump-out will be easier for them to d/w

        

 

I got the impression that she was fairy enamoured but that her particular circumstances were not right.

 

LBG is a master of 'bad words' - I like it.

Oh come on stop posting facts that dont fit certain peoples mindset? I mean I have had mine for years and years with no problems, apart from the ones invented on here

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16 minutes ago, peterboat said:

Oh come on stop posting facts that dont fit certain peoples mindset? I mean I have had mine for years and years with no problems, apart from the ones invented on here

 

 

I was musing about your relaxed attitude to burying your compost on other people's land. 

 

I wondered if you would be ok with passing composting toilet users stopping off and burying their compost in your garden. 

 

If not, why not? 

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3 hours ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

 

I was musing about your relaxed attitude to burying your compost on other people's land. 

 

I wondered if you would be ok with passing composting toilet users stopping off and burying their compost in your garden. 

 

If not, why not? 

They could pop it in my composting bin if they wanted to, thats where the dog do goes from the moorings, plus all the veg matter, it would work for me?

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2 hours ago, peterboat said:

They could pop it in my composting bin if they wanted to, thats where the dog do goes from the moorings, plus all the veg matter, it would work for me?

What about them digging a hole and dumping it without permission?  Would that work for you?

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20 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Human waste contains many drugs and pathogens which are not in animal slurry.

 

Even treated sewage sludge is limited in the amount that can be used - it must also be tested by the waste authority and 'cleared' for use on the land.

 

The negatives of using TREATED SEWAGE SLUDGE (extract from Monkey's Link)

 

The negatives are it can contain potentially toxic elements (PTEs) which are a risk to human, plant and animal health.

PTEs include elements such as zinc, cadmium, mercury, chromium, selenium and arsenic.

Sludge may also contain virus and disease-causing pathogens including salmonellae, beef tapeworm eggs and potato cysts nematodes.

 

All sorts of nasties can leach out of sewage and sewage sludge and leach into waterways :

 

Britain faces a £30bn bill to clean up rivers, streams and drinking water supplies contaminated by synthetic hormones from contraceptive pills. Drastic reductions in these chemicals, which have been linked to collapses in fish populations, are proposed in the latest European Union water framework directive.

But the plan, which would involve upgrading the sewage network and significantly increasing household water bills, is controversial. Water and pharmaceutical companies dispute the science involved and argue the costs are prohibitive. By contrast, many environmental researchers say the proposal is sound.

I may have mentioned this before....In the Slough area there was a waste system of road Tankers which would spread Human Slurry on local Farmland .they stopped doing it a decade or two ago.The Tankers had CINAGRO written on them , which is  ,of course Organic written backwards.

I met a retired chap on the Towpath who drove one of those Tankers back in the Day,I asked him where the slurry was currently dumped and he told me that it went down a huge Hole in a Farmers Field somewhere in the Midlands.... 

I wonder what happens when the Hole gets filled in ?

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22 minutes ago, Jerra said:

What about them digging a hole and dumping it without permission?  Would that work for you?

He would be lucky apart from my garden the rest is solid! Its not going to stop me doing the same again, if because of stoppages I have to get rid of a bucket of compost, it is a piece of waste land there are plenty of them all over the canal network  so for me its an easy one.

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When I was a kid they emptied the septic tank every Monday from the council houses where I lived, by then it had normally overflowed and was running down the road way. Anyway this tanker would arrive and suck the contents out of the tank, drive about a mile outside the village and pump it into a large pit on the end of a field. The pit use to maintain a level about a foot below ground level and we use to go and shoot the rats with airguns as they ran over the crust.

 

Back to boats, not a hundred years ago hire boats had bucket and chuckets and I understand they also supplied a spade to dispose of it ir you got taken short.

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36 minutes ago, peterboat said:

He would be lucky apart from my garden the rest is solid! Its not going to stop me doing the same again, if because of stoppages I have to get rid of a bucket of compost, it is a piece of waste land there are plenty of them all over the canal network  so for me its an easy one.

Surely however dumping untreated sewage is illegal for a reason such as health risks.

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30 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

Anyway this tanker would arrive and suck the contents out of the tank, drive about a mile outside the village and pump it into a large pit on the end of a field. The pit use to maintain a level about a foot below ground level and we use to go and shoot the rats with airguns as they ran over the crust.

 

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18 hours ago, ditchcrawler said:

When I was a kid they emptied the septic tank every Monday from the council houses where I lived, by then it had normally overflowed and was running down the road way. Anyway this tanker would arrive and suck the contents out of the tank, drive about a mile outside the village and pump it into a large pit on the end of a field. The pit use to maintain a level about a foot below ground level and we use to go and shoot the rats with airguns as they ran over the crust.

 

Back to boats, not a hundred years ago hire boats had bucket and chuckets and I understand they also supplied a spade to dispose of it ir you got taken short.

We started canal boating in July 1967 (I can tell you the date and time if you really want to know!) with a hire boat that had a sea toilet (ie pumped out into the canal) and a year later our own very tiny (20 ft) ex BW hire boat which was equipped with bucket and chuckit - I became very proficient at digging discreet holes under hedges. (Although I could tell an amusing anecdote about one occasions when using someone else's boat with similar provision)

 

So: much less than 100 years ago . . . 

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53 minutes ago, Mike Todd said:

We started canal boating in July 1967 (I can tell you the date and time if you really want to know!) with a hire boat that had a sea toilet (ie pumped out into the canal) and a year later our own very tiny (20 ft) ex BW hire boat which was equipped with bucket and chuckit - I became very proficient at digging discreet holes under hedges. (Although I could tell an amusing anecdote about one occasions when using someone else's boat with similar provision)

 

So: much less than 100 years ago . . . 

My family own moorings on the River Great Ouse and on the EA waterways 'sea-toilets'  are still permitted. When visiting the Norfolk Broads said toilets are sealed up and the old bucket and chuck it wheeled out of the back of the lockers. 

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