Toilet toilet toilet
Ten years ago, when I asked a British old man what he thought of China's tourism industry, and he said, toilet, toilet, toilet.
He said that in China's tourist spots at that time, toilet was a big issue and the hygene was not very good. Therefore to leave tourists a good impression we should rebuild our toilets and make them clean.
But when I really wrote a story about China's toilet 'revolution' when many new style modern clean toilets were built, a colleague was laughing saying to think of this topic will feel stink.
But this is an important issue. Ten years ago when I went to Sydney, I found all the toilets in public area has toilet paper and by the beach there is shower, but the water is not too much, the spray in New Zealand is also small to save water.
As we know that household water in China is still just one type, that is all underground water. So toilet flush is the same as the water we drink. This way as we have more and more houses and apartments in Beijing, water shortage has become serious.
By now the construction of civilian buildings still don't have water treatment process and reuse of waste water. We do have some treatment of industrial waste water which is released to rivers or lakes or even watering grass in the garden. But household water is still not reused.
Many individuals start to learn to use water several times for washing clothes and then sweeping the floor, or washing the dishes and then use the water to water the flowers or plants. But this is just among individuals, but not systematic reuse of water which will substantially help save water.
On the other hand, to treat household water and remove the phosphate in it for agricultural use can be very beneficial both to agriculture and to environment.
Lena Westholm, a senior lecturer in Marlandalen University in Sweden is researching in this field. She says she is researching to find a better material than sand to remove phosphate from household waste water including that from kitchen and toilet, or black and grey water.
She is researching this in small scale because in city area, city water treatment has worked very well and all the water connected to the system has been treated and clean. But households in countryside still release untreated waste water. She says she hopes to get more funding in this area so that all the water released to rivers and lakes are clean and on the other hand, the phosphate can be taken out for agricultural fertilizers.
It's hoped that more research will contribute to sustainable development and environment protection.
