SMART SANITATION
FOR A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE
It's time to rethink wastewater management. A shift towards a decentralised, circular wastewater management system will benefit cities, agriculture and the biodiversity of rivers and oceans.
A STEP TOWARDS SUSTAINABLE WASTEWATER
MANAGEMENT
Urine is something that most people probably don’t think much about, and when they do, it’s rarely in a positive context. That is a shame, because there is much more potential in urine than you might think. It is worth considering urine as a raw material.
save! is a pioneering urine separation toilet that takes a step towards sustainable wastewater management by preserving the nutrients contained in urine and at the same time protecting the environment from harmful substances.
CONFRONTING A HIDDEN DANGER
The way we dispose of human waste has changed very little in centuries, and is now a major contributing factor to one of the most urgent environmental issues facing the planet. A series of studies by leading scientists ranks excessive nitrogen levels caused by sewage and the agricultural use of fertilisers as more threatening even than rising CO2 levels and climate change.
There is a need to readdress the infrastructure around wastewater treatment, which currently represents a major pathway for the introduction of nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) and micropollutants (hormones and medical residues) to surface water. Efforts to remove these pollutants have so far caused wastewater management infrastructure to become even more expensive, cumbersome and increasingly energy intensive.
PREVIEWING SAVE! +
Building on the knowledge gained from save!, LAUFEN is previewing save!+, a toilet that reduces flush volumes by 75% when combined with a low-vacuum evacuation system, while maintaining the environmental benefits of urine diverting. Designed in cooperation with EOOS, for off-grid applications, the save!+ toilet is a low cost, robust, hygienic and dignified complement to on-site waste treatment innovations but can also be used in any project that leverage the low flush volume and the urine separation. Such features make it the ideal choice for water-scarce areas and eco-friendly waste systems including composting, biogas and cascading wetlands.
SOURCE SEPARATION TECHNOLOGY
Since the mid-1990s, one of the world’s leading water research organisations, the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology (Eawag), has been examining potential alternative ways to reduce pollution from wastewater. One particularly interesting direction identified by Eawag is Source Separation Technology, which involves separating domestic wastewater at the source into urine, faeces and greywater.
If the different types of wastewater are kept separate rather than mixed, these different streams can be sustainably processed and usable resources can be extracted. Eawag’s research into resource recovery has focused on urine as it contains most of the nutrients that cause harmful effects such as excessive nutrient load (eutrophication) on ecosystems.
The scientists have developed a process for recovering nutrients from urine while removing micropollutants hormons and medical residues using small, highly efficient decentralised reactors. As a result, around 80 percent of the nitrogen found in sewage can be removed from the wastewater stream, which will in turn reduce the resources required to operate treatment plants.
A CIRCULAR CONCEPT
The use of decentralised reactors to enable more flexible wastewater management has been pioneered by Vuna – a spinoff of Eawag in Zurich. The treatment process uses microbial transformation, activated carbon filtration and distillation to transform source-separated urine into a fertiliser called Aurin which has been officially licensed by the Swiss Federal Office for Agriculture for use on all plants.
A HIGH-PERFORMANCE SOLUTION
The Austrian design studio EOOS, Eawag and LAUFEN have developed a pioneering urine-diverting toilet that revolutionises the user interface for sustainable urban water management. save! is an evolution of the pioneering Blue Diversion Toilet, which was developed by EOOS and Eawag and supported by a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
save! is the first gravity flushed urine-diverting toilet to meet the latest industry standards of conventional toilets. It passively separates urine from solids and flush water so it can be treated using systems such as a fast, simple and organic wastewater management process developed by Vuna.
The product’s key innovation is a “Urine Trap” invented by EOOS Design, which directs urine towards a concealed outlet using only surface tension. Laufen applied this concept to a new toilet design featuring a ceramic bowl that is optimally shaped to guide the water flow. The interface’s easy maintenance, low-tech, hidden innovation ensures it is indistinguishable from any other high-end WC. save! represents a new format for a familiar product that is business ready and could play a key role in the future of wastewater management.
SMARTER SANITATION FOR SMARTER CITIES
According to Professor Tove Larsen from Eawag’s Department for Urban Water Management: “Wastewater management is vital if we are to prevent catastrophic damage to the world’s rivers and oceans. save! represents a breakthrough in the quest for effective, hygienic wastewater separation that is invisible to the end user. Finally, there is a sanitation solution that is fit for the 21st century”.
GLOBAL ACCESS
In late 2018, Bill Gates appeared on stage at the Reinvented Toilet Expo in Beijing holding a jar filled with human excrement. Gates wanted to highlight the dangers facing around 2.3 billion people who don’t have access to basic sanitation facilities. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation invests in the research and development of ecological sanitation for those most at risk. Laufen is fully committed to supporting the evolution of innovative solutions to this urgent problem. To safeguard 21st century sanitation for the world’s poorest citizens, the company will develop a source separating squat toilet for local production. The design will be made available for anyone to produce and distribute in developing countries. This new solution will help to save lives and improve conditions across the developing world.
PRODUCT INFORMATION
The key innovation in save! is the urine trap, created by EOOS Design. It uses the hydrodynamic principle of the teapot effect to conduct the urine towards a concealed outlet using only surface tension. The intelligent design of the ceramic body ensures that the urine separation occurs irrespective of whether the toilet is used by a man, a woman or a child. Flushing water, which is discharged at a much higher rate and speed, runs down the regular syphon. The same applies to solids and toilet paper, which also fall into the syphon.
ARCHITECTURAL PROJECTS AND CASE STUDIES
Project: FLUX
Architect: FSP Architekten AG
Developer: Halter AG
Location: Dübendorf, Switzerland
Description:
The FLUX building, on the campus of Eawag in Dübendorf, Switzerland, houses the departments Process Engineering, Sanitation, Water and Solid Waste for Development, as well as the Ecotox Centre. In addition to research laboratories, the multifunctional building also offers spaces for teaching, training laboratories and further education courses. MINERGIE-ECO® certified.
LAUFEN assortment: 20 LAUFEN save! separation toilets with save! installation frame, 10 LAUFEN Lema waterless urinals.
Urine treatment solution / partner: VunaNexus
Project: The Place to Pee
Partners: Hydrohm, Ghent University, City of Ghent, LAUFEN
Location: Ghent, Belgium
Description:
The Place to Pee is the title of an installation realized during the summer months of 2021 in the sports and recreation park Blaarmeersen, in Ghent. Serving as a temporary public toilet facility during the high summer season, a container was adapted and equipped with LAUFEN save! toilets and LAUFEN Lema urinals, as well as with Hydrohm’s Uridis treatment system, a high-tech solution for recycling urine into disinfecting flush water. The project was led by the Belgian company Hydrohm in cooperation with the Ghent University, the City of Ghent and LAUFEN.
LAUFEN assortment: 03 LAUFEN save! separation toilets with save! installation frame, 02 waterless Lema urinals, Val washbasins with Twintronic faucets, Leelo mirrors, Pro Liberty accessible WC, Pro Liberty accessible washbasin with Twintronic faucet.
Urine treatment solution / partner: Uridis - Hydrohm
Project: Harrison's Primary School Sanitation Redevelopment
Partners: LAUFEN, Harrison's Primary School (Swiss non-profit association)
Location: Mombasa, Kenya
Description:
Harrison's Primary School, located in an area with scarce rainfall and limited infrastructure, transitioned from basic pit latrines to modern, sustainable sanitation facilities in 2023. The redevelopment included the installation of save! urine-separation toilets, a worm-based faeces treatment system, and rainwater harvesting stations. Powered by rainwater and solar energy, the system supports a vegetable garden fertilised with processed waste, providing a sustainable and educational model for resource conservation.
LAUFEN assortment: 06 LAUFEN save! separation toilets with save! installation frame.
Urine treatment solution / partner: Integrated worm filter system for faeces composting, combined with a wetland filtration area for wastewater treatment.
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