STABILIZATION OF HUMAN FECES BY COMPOSTING SCHEME IN BATCH

Abstract

The Ecological Sanitation (Ecosan) refers to the residuary waters management system focusing in a principle of recycle the water and the nutrients back to their generating source. Segregate faeces and urine, avoiding their mixture, is one of the Ecosan’s basics markings. The human faeces obtained after the segregation have valuable qualities for soil improvement, however the main abstraction in this nutrients recycling is the association with enteric pathogens. The composting is the most common treatment to reach a disinfection of the faeces when the goal is its application as soil conditioner. In this sense, the objectives were characterize the excreta under a physico-chemical and biological’s view; study the optimum conditions of composting human faeces with carbonaceous addition from sawdust and confirm the quality of the final compost to application on soil. The used methodology was separated in two stages: I. faeces quali-quantitative characterization and II. human faeces composting by application of three sawdust’s proportions. The obtained result was the temperature over than 50°C and a reduction of Escherichia coli to not detectable levels.

Key Words: Ecological Sanitation; Human Faeces; Composting; Reuse.