Thirsty Anybody? Bill Gates is Turning Poo into Water!

Clean drinking water and proper sanitation is something that developed nations often take for granted. Being able to dispose of waste without affecting your water supply is something many view as a basic right, but in developing nations this isn’t the case. It is estimated that poor sanitation kills 700,000 children per year, with many more developing serious physical or mental illnesses.

The extensive networks of sewer systems and treatment plants used in Western countries are too complex and expensive to cope with the immediate threat caused by unsafe drinking water, but The Gates Foundation, headed by Bill Gates, has discovered an alternative.

The Janicki OmniProcessor, named after Janicki Bioenergy CEO Peter Janicki who invented the contraption, tackles two birds with one stone by taking hazardous waste and transforming it into a much needed, valuable commodity– that’s right, Bill Gates is turning feces into water.

This isn’t the first time poo has featured on Pollution Solutions. Rather than viewing this simply as an unpleasant waste product, some clever boffins have successfully managed to use the excrement as an energy source, harnessing its power to run a 40-seater bus between Bristol Airport and Bath.

How does it work?

Waste is boiled dry and then burned, creating steam. The steam is directed to a steam engine and powers a generator that produces enough electricity to power the entire process, plus extra to send to local communities. Water vapour extracted from the feces during the initial boiling process is then finely filtered, leaving pure, clean drinking water. The whole process, from sludge to sip, takes less than ten minutes.

With a completely self-sufficient electricity source, and no extra waste created by the process besides a little ash, the Janicki OmniProcessor seems almost too good to be true. There must be a drawback, right? Can water extracted from fecal matter actually taste good? Luckily, Gates has first-hand experience:

 “I watched the piles of feces go up the conveyor belt and drop into a large bin. They made their way through the machine, getting boiled and treated. A few minutes later, I took a long taste of the end result: a glass of delicious drinking water… The water tasted as good as any I’ve had out of a bottle. And having studied the engineering behind it, I would happily drink it every day. It’s that safe.”

What could it mean for the future?

The Janicki OmniProcessor is currently being piloted in Senegal, but hopes are high for a global rollout. Gates has been open about the commercial potential, indicating that entrepreneurs taking on the system will be able to sell on the precious water and excess electricity for a price. Nonetheless, the change this could bring for countries struggling to cope with the most basic of needs is paving the way for development and sanitation; proving that one man’s waste is another man’s water.