Because cable news is so completely and notoriously unreliable when it come to reporting on truly newsworthy material, today’s special edition of B-fuzzled World News and Commentary brings you up to date on the Toilet Tech Fair, held this past March in New Delhi, India. While the Elite Media Liberals wasted time and precious copy space covering whatever was supposedly “news” that day, millions of concerned citizens worldwide completely missed out on the latest developments on how to transform human waste into “profit-generating resources”. While I do not suggest deliberate misconduct on the part of the news outlets, I do feel that this information was willfully eliminated.
Katy D., fearless and intrepid reporter for the Associated Press, tactfully and sensitively handled this inspiring event, which reporting I will expound, explicate, and elucidate. She writes: “Who would have expected a toilet to one day filter water, charge a cellphone or create charcoal to combat climate change?
“These are lofty ambitions….Yet, scientists and toilet innovators around the world say these are exactly the sort of goals needed to improve global public health amid challenges such as poverty, water scarcity and urban growth.”
[In the growing category of What Kind of Child Decides To Be A ______When She Grows Up, we now stack “Toilet Innovator” next to “People Who Name Paint Colors”.]
“Scientists who accepted the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's challenge to reinvent the toilet showcased their inventions in the Indian capital Saturday. The primary goal: to sanitize waste, use minimal water or electricity, and produce a usable product at low cost.”
[This choice of words was somewhat worrisome to me--to which usable product might they be referring?]
“India is by far the worst culprit [of poor sanitation], with more than 640 million people defecating in the open and producing a stunning 72,000 tons of human waste each day — the equivalent weight of almost 10 Eiffel Towers or 1,800 humpback whales.”
[I would just like to pause a moment to let these facts and figures sink in. As usually happens when I read the news, I am left with a greater number of questions unanswered than answered: First, who is actually counting these people--another strong contender in the category of What Kind of Child Decides To Be A___________ When She Grows Up. Secondly, who is weighing and tracking the daily output of human waste? And third, seriously? Did you just compare the weight of mountains of dung to the Eiffel Tower, let alone humpback whales?]
“To be successful, scientists said, the designs being exhibited at Saturday's Toilet Fair had to go beyond treating urine and feces as undesirable waste, and recognize them as profit-generating resources for electricity, fertilizer or fuel.”
[I am reasonably confident that the lofty goals of “improving global public health amid challenges such as poverty, water scarcity and urban growth” just got flushed down the sewer.]
“The University of the West of England, Bristol, showcased a urine-powered fuel cell to charge cellphones overnight.
“Another team from the University of Colorado, Boulder, brought a system concentrating solar power through fiber optic cables to heat waste to about 300 degrees Celsius. Aside from killing pathogens, the process creates a charcoal-like product called biochar useful as cooking fuel or fertilizer.
[This seems another appropriate place to pause: Call it what you will, I have trouble imagining the family gathered around the backyard BBQ on Friday night, and Dad saying, “Jimmy! Go grab a bucket of biochar! It’s time for S’Mores."]
“A team from Beijing Sunnybreeze Technologies Inc. also brought a solar-biochar system, but with the solar panels heating air that will dry sludgy human waste into nuggets that are then heated further under low-oxygen conditions to create biochar.”
[Two important things to note here: One--Sunnybreeze is a very pleasant, if slightly misleading, name for a company that studies how to repackage poop into a profit-generating resource. Two--The use of the word “nuggets” in this sentence is incredibly ill-advised.]
“'Toilets are more common in [the southern Indian state of] Kerala than they are in much of the country, but no one wants to clean them', said Bincy Baby [I just need to interrupt at this point to say that this is an amazingly awesome name. Okay. Moving on:] of Eram Scientific Solutions.
'There is a stigma. [um. yes.] The lowest of the low are the ones who clean the toilets,’ Baby said. Eram's solution is a coin-operated eToilet with an electronic system that triggers an automated, self-cleaning mechanism. With 450 prototypes now looped into sewage systems across India, electrical engineers are lining up for jobs as toilet technicians. 'Now, they're proud of their jobs.'"
[I am speechless.]
In summary:
1. A little creative branding goes a long way.
2. Why settle for “improving global public health amid challenges such as poverty, water scarcity and urban growth” when you can go for “profit-generating resources”?
3. At any given time, there must be a whole lot of third graders in this world with some rather peculiar career choices.
I'm just gonna leave this here: Night soil men or gong farmer.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I suspect that in dealing with the waste of a country the size of India, they are less likely to get a response to public health calls than profit-generating calls. That's freemarket capitalism at it's finest.
But your commentary cracked me up as usual. Really, if you haven't read any of Terry Pratchett's Discworld books, you really should. I think you'd enjoy them. Even though there is a chronological order to the books, there are so many characters, you can pick up just about any book in the series and enjoy it on its own merits.
Although you bring up a good point, or perhaps *because* you bring up a good point, I would like to remind you that my blogs are not supposed to helpful in any way, shape, form, configuration, contour, or pattern. Except perhaps for a fractal, because it's fun to say. Fractal. Fractal. Fractal.
ReplyDeleteoh. and throw the word "be" in there as needed.
ReplyDelete