The Peepoo

Flying toilets are a common problem in urban areas like slums. To provide access to safe and acceptable toilet system in urban areas with a dense and generally poor population, one has to face the challenges of the lack of availability of space, willingness to pay and the absence of an institutional infrastructure. The Peepoo toilet could be an alternative solution. It is a personal, biodegradable toilet for single-use. It can be used either sitting or standing, where and whenever the user wants and it is easy to carry around. After use it can be stored odour free up to 12 to 24h until it is handed over to the collection system and finally buried in the soil, where it serves as fertiliser.

Another option is for people in urban slums to use it in their home gardens, so called vertical gardens. The big advantage is that no fix infrastructure and thus no space and no investment costs are needed as it can be distributed very quickly and easily. However, in order to get the full value from the Peepoo solution, using it as a high value fertiliser for local farmers and other agriculture businesses, a logistical infrastructure is required for the collection of used Peepoos.This also helps in avoiding accumulation in people’s backyard. Moreover, no water is needed which makes this technology suitable for water scarce areas.

The Peepoo is in the form of a slim and elongated bag (14 x 38 cm). Within the bag there is a thin inner-gauze (26 x 24 cm), and a filling of urea. When the urea comes into contact with faeces or urine, a breakdown into ammonia and carbonate takes place, driven by enzymes, which are naturally occurring in faeces. As the urea is broken down, the pH value of the material increases and hygienisation begins. Organisms, which produce diseases (pathogens) and may be found in faeces (bacteria, viruses and parasites) are inactivated within 2 to 4 weeks depending on the surrounding temperature. In the end, when the Peepoo degrades in the soil, the ammonia acts as a harmless fertiliser taken up by plants.

The Peepoo is designed to be used once, either sitting, squatting or standing. If one uses the Peepoo by holding it with only the hand, the thin inner gauze (green in the picture above) prevents all contact with the excrement. The Peepoo can also be placed in a cut plastic bottle or small bucket and used as a chamber pot. Peepoos are odour free for at least 24 hours after use and can thus be stored in the immediate environment.

Peepoo toilets are very low cost. In the beginning Peepoos were distributed for free in case studies, but since October 2010 the Peepoos are for sale in the urban slum of Kibera in the outskirts of Nairobi, Kenya. The average cost for Peepoo users in the urban slum is estimated to be about 10 USD per person per year. The calculation includes a drop point system where the users are refunded for handing in their used Peepoos, that later can be used as valuable fertilisers (Personal communication the Peepoople team 2011). This system requires that the market for Peepoo fertiliser has been developed and that there is an interest to run the collection points and pay the Peepoo users their refunds (see demand creation).

Compared to other toilets there are no installation costs: Peepoos require no large infrastructure solutions (except for collection points) and no pipes need to be built. Nor is there any need for any overhead system or investment costs. But in order to be an economically sustainable solution a logistic system is required that includes the Peepoo toilets distribution, collection and processing (market-based solution to cover Peepoo costs or managed by public service) (GTZ 2009).

The Peepoo is hygienic: sealing the Peepoo after use cuts contact between excreta with land, water, insects, animals and people. Each Peepoo contains 4 g of urea, which work to rapidly destroy pathogens (including the hard to destroy helminth eggs). This so-called “ammonia-based” sanitation technology makes the excreta safe to use as fertiliser within a relatively short period of storage (2 to 4 weeks at an average temperature of at least 20ºC).