2500 years ago, life was hard: not only there was no access to internet access – by submarine cable or satellite – there weren’t sanitation systems. In urban centers, people would often die early because of the contamination of sources of clean water by human waste and the consequent waterborne diseases.
Luckily, at the same time, the Etruscans invented systems to address sanitation to be available to all in Rome They knew that sanitation needs to be provided to the full society. If provided only for the rich, it would not be effective. It wouldn’t stop diseases and contamination of clean water for all: either rich and poor. The Romans then occupied the city, and recognized the value of Sanitation and Clean Water. They expanded the systems to the Roman Empire and others from there to the rest of the World. But 2500 year later have not reached every capital city…
It is likely that Jesus Christ, him self, benefited from safer water and sanitation systems that ensured safe treatment of human waste. At least, reduced considerable risks of contamination and diseases.
Today, 2024, the UN also established the same Goal: 100% of access to sanitation for all. The only way to ensure Healthy People, regardless of their income level. United Nations Global Goals 6 – Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all.
Everyone should think about where their own shit goes. Maybe a good start to promote the necessary change to improve the Environment and Wellbeing of the #1 Happy Planet Index.
What is then a Safe Sanitation System?
Sanitation does not end at the toilet, it actually just begin there.
The feces and urine are the input in a toilet, which output is excreta (both products together).
Each component of the sanitation system receives an input and produces an output. The end outcome of a Safe Sanitation System is clean water , compost, and possibly energy while ensuring the eradication of all pathogens and the improving of public health and environment.
The 6 main components of a Safe Sanitation System are:
- Collection by an interface – The Toilet – the input is human waste or excreta (urine and feces). It is essential that everyone have access to regularly cleaned toilets – private or shared – to prevent open defecation, contamination of the environment that makes people sick.
- Containment / Storage – of black water (excreta and kitchen water with pathogens and grease) and grey water (liquids from sinks, showers and washing machines) in septic tanks, pits, or other storage devices, need to be appropriately used and maintained to prevent any leakage. Namely contamination of the ground water that may be used to drink or other human use.
- Emptying – the procedure needs to be made in a safe way, to prevent leakage to the environment. Usually by pumps into a truck, as in Vanuatu there is no sewerage systems installed to households, like there was in Rome 2500 years ago.
- Transport of the waste to a Waste Water Treatment Plant can be done by Sewerage (or sewage system) is the infrastructure that conveys sewage or surface runoff (storm water, meltwater, rainwater) using sewers, conduit or pipes to move the waste. As this system doesn’t exist in Vanuatu for human waste, all the transport needs to be done by a vehicle. Usually with trucks with a maximum capacity of 4000 litters. The transport needs to be done to ensure no leakage and needs to be happen for the 100% of the toilets of Port Vila to ensure a safe system.
- Treatment – there are no collective functional waste-water plants properly managed in Port Vila.
- Disposal – Only after sedimentation and elimination of pathogens the ‘clean water’ can be disposed into the environment, but never, by the Vanuatu law directly into rivers, lagoons or Ocean, and solid waste used as compost.
There is a methodology to measure the if a Sanitation system is safe called SHITFLOW, and is the analysis of the inputs and outputs of the waste along the sanitation system until is discharged into to the environment safely without the chance of contaminating People of the Environment.
In Port Vila, only 21% of the human waste is safely managed.
(UNICEF, 2020, presented to Waste Water Task Force)
Basic urban services include affordable housing, access to water supply and sanitation, mobility and electricity.
From the analysis of the SHIT FLOW: Sanitation it seems not to be a priority in Port Vila. This impacts on public health, economic productivity and the environment and many other development aspects.
Unplanned urbanization impacts negatively on People’s life and the Environment, leading to unintended creation of slums, social inequality, overcrowding, environmental pollution, inadequate service provision, increased strain on natural resources including land and water, higher emission of greenhouse gases.
Investments in Sanitation lead to benefits in public health reducing human suffer. By having healthy People, public expenditure in the Health Sector is reduced with increases of productivity, as workers have less sick leave with evident benefits for the economy and private sector,
The Education Sector also has to win with improved Sanitation. Reducing exposure to harmful pathogens in fecal waste, children, will get sick less often, improving school attendance, hence the education outcomes and the quality of the workforce.
Environmental protection by treating the fecal waste streams and preventing leaks into the environment, ensures food security and livelihoods. The deplorable state of the pollution of the Erakor Lagoons is a result of the negligent investment in sanitation in the Port Vila, particularly in the Vila Central Hospital. This is also a considerable threat to the Tourism sector from which the country depends for revenue considering the amount of Tourism investments at the Erakor Lagoons.
But, the responsible authorities are not really concern with maintaining Sanitation Systems functional, a petty thing of nuts and bolts…
It is a surprising statement, if not negligent and dangerous, to the Public Health of the People who use the Lagoon to swim and fish (in spite of the Chiefs Tabu Department of Water Resources instruction in the same direction). There is a consistent evidence made public by DWR that the location seaside, where the dysfunctional waste water treatment plant for the last 37 years is leaking directly the equivalent of a daily 25 trucks X 4000 liters of waste water, blood, chemicals, antibiotics, etc. (data from the tender documents to construct a new waste water treatment – not nuts and bolts as stated) into the Erakor Lagoons as per the evidence from https://coastalwater.vu/coastal-water-quality-data-base/
DG MoH said: May 2024 the system should be completed. It is now August 2024. The Vanuatu Central Hospital Waste Water Treatment Plant is not operational in the last 37 years.
PETITION: SAVE THE ERAKOR LAGOONS , Thank yu Tumas!
(UNICEF 2020)
Sanitation promotes dignity and boosts safety improving Social Development and creates many jobs, so great for Economical development.
Sanitation is a source of revenue for municipalities by enforcing regulations, allows significant collection of fees for the sanitation services, and fines to prevent lack of compliance essential, while ensuring safe People’s public health.
If well managed, Sanitation reduces greenhouse gas emissions, while reducing vulnerabilities of local communities to climate events.
Port Vila Urban Development Project (PVUDP) was implemented from13 February 2013 to 31st December 2017. Regarding Sanitation this is an extract from the official government website.
Port Vila is the commercial and tourist center for Vanuatu. Although Port Vila’s population has grown by 400% since independence, there has been limited Urban Planning and major infrastructure since then. The Project will;
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- (?) Investment and tourism
- improve traffic flow
- make Port Vila healthier and safer
- protect environment, including the harbor and lagoon
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Output 2
The Government has improved sanitation system in greater Port Vila. This output will improve the disposal and treatment of sludge from domestic and commercial septic tanks through improving the management of the privately operated sludge collection and disposal system;
design and construction of a sludge treatment plant (STP) and disposal facility;
transfer of the sludge disposal site from its current location in Bouffa to a new site for disposal and treatment of sludge (which will also be the site for a full-scale sewage treatment in the future); and
construction of a biogas plant as a clean development mechanism (CDM) project. The STP will be the first-ever sludge treatment plant and a first step toward a piped sewerage system. The STP will be designed to include a biogas plant to generate electricity through capture of methane, with potential for earning carbon credits.
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This is not the first time that Sanitation is a source of theories without any practice. Studies and consultancy are a great source of income for professionals and experts, particularly when nothing is actually is implemented. A never ending story, like this solution for sanitation presented in 2011 for Vanuatu. The sanitation consultancy industry has a promising future with the announcing new cities without addressing sanitation of the existing ones.
(Learn how our treatment plants work – not in Vanuatu)
It is hard to understand if the project aimed to achieve safe treatment of sludge in Port Vila as defined in technical literature to define a safe treatment of human waste.
Disposing sludge into 3 Lagoons in Buffa is not a safe sanitation system. It may be contaminating ground water and rivers. In that case would not be legal, just like Vila Central Hospital Waste Water treatment Plant
This is what is visible from google map as of Aug 2024:
Apart from apparent 3 Lagoons, it is not possible to observe infrastructure of a Waste Water Treatment Plant of a station to produce energy from methane.
If the Lagoons are simply a place for disposal that won’t ensure safe treatment of waste water and elimination of pathogens. If the water leakage to ground water or Teoma river may be a risk to people and nature.
Like the Vila Central Hospital waste water treatment dysfunctional for 37 years, it is not possible to confirm if there are technical staff managing the system.
Apparently, funds were insufficient to complete all the scope of the project till end of 2017, so hard to understand what was actually done and not done. Not only that, what is actually functioning, because a sanitation system implies Technical capacity to operate it, not only dispose of sludge in a tank.
The Project Port Vila Urban Development Project (PVUDP) also promised the improvement of the traffic flow.
Due to the lack of public investment on roads maintenance, wealthy individuals, businesses and government are investing heavily in SUV cars, with high operation costs of maintenance, fuel, and high emissions of green gas emissions. The car centric infrastructure development seems to be a vicious cycle that is depleting the People’s resources to invest in Sanitation. Cars and fuel seems to be where the money goes in a country that declared Climate Emergency and is advocating for Fossil Fuel phase out till 2030.
It is unknown any subsequent project to complete the Sanitation Component of the Port Vila Urban Development Project (PVUDP). in 2024, sanitation seems not to be a priority, the facto.
It seems that Port Vila had a missed opportunity to improve Sanitation in Port Vila in 2017.
500 years before Jesus Christ was born, sanitation and waste water treatment was considered a priority in Rome. This urban planning priority have been expanded to the rest of the World.
Social media influencers advocating for water and sanitation for all, are urgently needed in Vanuatu …
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