Setting up a Dry Toilet - Stop flushing the Planet's Precious Resources and Your Money down the Sewers. Introduction

Preamble: A Few Facts and Figures 

(in French but bills are bills in any language!)

Before

&

After

 and in financial terms too.....

What is interesting about the above bill is that the actual water used has gone from 45 cubic metres to 13 cubic metres, so the water consumed now costs us over two thirds less than before. The main cost is the standing charge, which is now equivalent to nearly double the price of the water we consume! Even more of a reason, in our new place, to get a borehole dug. A good gauge to tell you when you should be off the grid and consequently off mains water, is when your consumption costs are less than the standing charges or line rental.

Three Great Reasons to Sort out Your Own Manure

Two years ago due to a change in car-parking, we ended up entering our usual visit to the Salon Ille et Bio - Guichen Organic Fair, via the front entrance, Community Hall rather than our usual way through the Community Organic Garden. For the first time we noticed a whiteboard, where visitors could express themselves with some sort of observation or thought for the day. The visitor in front of us took up the marker pen and wrote "Flush toilets are an abomination - they should be banned". Travelling home, an hour's drive, gave us plenty of time to think over and discuss this amongst other great things we had seen at the Fair.

Time was in the essence because an EEC Directive meant that our village was now to be put on mains sewage. The result would mean that like it or not in the following years instead of grey water eventually filtering back into the land, which was fine by us, we use no chemical products whatsoever, all our water would end up in the Sewage Treatment Plant. For the past few years we had had a waterfilled recycled wine bag in the cistern to cut down the volume of water at each flush this but this now seemed insignificant. The water, the urine and the solid mater, were all a useful by-product of us eating and drinking organic food, we decided the time was ripe for us to take control of our own valuable resource. We needed to break away from an insane system, which pours chemicals and energy into water to get it to potable standard only to flush it down the sewers. If we needed a further incentive, then saving money completed the deal. When we got back home we started to draw up plans.

 

My system costs under 10Euros/Dollars, I started with the compost bin, which can also of course be used as the model for a standard compost bin for your garden and household waste. The recommended time for the humanure to be  ready for use is two years but already after three months you will find it has started to rot down. The bin is made of untreated, recycled pallet wood and the only other item you will need to make this work is the sawdust. Trust me it does not smell!. In the following articles I will show you how I set up our dry toilet, the woodwork involved and my system of minimal metal fixings which allows for movement of the planking and minimum costs. There are also updates and an alternative composting system for very cold climates:-

Pallet Wood Compost Bin and Dry Toilet Project Part 1

I opted for a completed bin size of 800mm x 800mm x  800mm, the wood used was recuperated from pallets.The unique design feature... read more

DIY Dry Toilet System for  8 Euros $11. Part 2 The Cabin

A practical design if you want to use this design for somewhere such as; your allotment, social garden, a field or even set up a business making them for others.... read more

DIY Dry Toilet System for  8 Euros $11. Part 3 The Seats

The toilet seat is for the ‘two bucket’ system. One side is for collecting liquid and the other is for solids...read more

DIY Dry Toilet System Part 3 The Seats continued

Continuing the above project with fitting out the interior...read more

Composting Urine Using a Straw Bale. Dry toilets for all climates.

A great way to process dry toilet liquid for around 6 Euros or 5 Dollars worth of materials... read more

Humanure - Two Years of Living with our Dry Toilet

Humanure is like death and taxes it's something we all know about but as the elephant in the room, are most loath to mention it...read more

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All the best, Andy

© Andy Colley 2014

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