Our ever changing climate presents major threats to both water and sanitation services. This we have known for some time! AND interestingly (perhaps tragically), sanitation is one of the contributors to THIS change.

The sanitation sector contributes between 2 and 6 percent of the earth’s methane and between 1 and 3 percent of the nitrous oxide emissions. While they are lower in concentration compared to carbon dioxide, they are powerful contributors.

To ensure universal access to water and sanitation services over the long-term requires not only that we understand and improve system and service resilience, BUT ALSO that we understand the emissions produced by different options, to ultimately reduce them where possible.

In this interview, Dorothee Spuhler speaks with Rebecca Ryals and Sasha Kramer about one such option. EcoSan has the potential to increase safety, sustainability and jobs, while mitigating climate change through the reduction of GHG gases and producing an effective fertilizer for agriculture. They discuss the research they have conducted to measure carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide from two EcoSan operations in Haiti, anaerobic waste stabilizations ponds, and a open field where sewage is known to be illegally dumped, to ultimately understand the fluxes related to non-sewered waste management.

You can read the paper here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959652619311576