Ready. Set. Go! The race to the high-tech toilet of the future is officially on. In early October, the International Organization for Standards, better known by its English acronym of ISO, published the第一技术标准对于厕所的属性和性能，该厕所在现场充分处理人类废物，而无需与下水道或排水系统联系，而无需与专用的供水联系。

不到两个月后，慈善家，前微软的首席比尔·盖茨（Bill Gates）“敬酒”了与会者Reinvented Toilet Expo in Beijingwith a beaker of human feces. Gates’ malodorous prop made a telling point — every human on the planet has to “go,” and there is an enormous market awaiting new products that can safely address the universal human need for sanitation without requiring costly sewers and squandering fresh water simply to transport human waste.

替代传统的厕所——定义d by ISO as a “Non-Sewered Sanitation System”— is a manufactured product the will serve an individual household, a small apartment building, or a public restroom. It must accept and treat all manner of human biological waste, and may accept additional types of household and personal waste if so designed by the manufacturer.

ISO已经建立了严格的标准，以破坏人类病原体以及噪声，空气排放和气味的限制。制造商必须对其产品进行一系列具有挑战性的测试，以证明达到这些标准。该设备的所有表面都应清洁，并且以前用户的存款无法可见。从消费者的角度来看，使用重新发明的厕所与使用常规厕所不会明显不同。

新产品非常接近现实

So is a Reinvented Toilet a real thing? “Very close to being real” is the best answer. Various teams, some with the support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, have products under development, and several devices are out of the lab and undergoing field trials.

有几种符合ISO标准的技术途径：基于电化学，生物学和基于燃烧的方法都在争夺中。目前尚不清楚一种方法是否会占上风，或者所有这些方法是否可以在全球市场中找到自己的利基市场。服务要求，保修，供应和分销链，以及 - 尤其是购买价格，尚未清楚。

北京博览会旨在展示那些最接近市场准备就绪的产品，但可能是前几年善意商业货物发生。

同时，测试和评估将继续进行，公司和公职人员将开始熟悉ISO标准的要求。在美国，国际水暖与机械官员协会（IAPMO）表示，其意图打算采用ISO标准作为美国国家标准，这应该减轻识别整个卫生和建筑法规标准的方式国家。加拿大国家的收养也在初次讨论中。

在过去的两年中，我有机会参加了参与ISO标准开发的美国技术咨询小组。去年5月，在尼泊尔ISO委员会的最后一次会议上，我记录了一些想法关于阈值，我们很快就会越过。

询问堆肥厕所（多年来可用的堆肥厕所）是否有资格是合乎逻辑的。答案可能不是。

The new ISO standard — and the goal for the “reinvented toilets” as originally scoped by the Gates Foundation — calls for complete treatment on site. The treatment standards are demanding, not only for bacteria like E. coli, but for viruses, protozoans, and worm eggs. Today’s generation of composting toilets may be a good solution for some locations, but it does not achieve the level of treatment called for in the standard. It is possible for biologically based treatment systems to be tested for qualification under the standard, as no particular technical approach is ruled out. But traditional composting alone is unlikely to meet the standard. Perhaps an enhanced approach will emerge in the years ahead.

公共卫生福利的潜力

重新发明厕所的公共卫生益处对于发展中国家将是巨大的，在缺乏废水基础设施中脱颖而出，并挽救了每年每年为可预防的疾病而浪费的数千人，在定居的人群和因冲突和自然灾害而流离失所的人群中。

But perhaps unexpectedly, reinvented toilets are likely to play the role of disruptive technology in many parts of the developed world as well, including North America. To begin with, remote and arid locations that attract large numbers of people are obvious candidates — music festivals like California’s Burning man, or the Grand Canyon, for instance.

但是，我们在农村社区中也有许多全职居民，其排水量不佳，缺水，多年冻土条件或基础设施不足 - 任何一个都可以使传统的卫生技术变得过于昂贵。

在更大范围内，整个非洲大陆的城市都面临着气候变化的变化及其对传统水源可靠性的影响。根据最近的调查of U.S. and Canadian cities, nearly 25% of all indoor water use in single-family homes is still devoted to flushing toilets, a luxury that may not be sustainable. And with our water and wastewater infrastructure suffering from decades of deferred maintenance, strategic placement of toilets that operate independent of these aging networks may well factor into the solutions we seek for resilient communities and just access to essential services.

The need for a new technology is acutely evident in cities such as Cape Town, South Africa, today. But before long, reinvented toilets may be finding their way to places like Atlanta, Los Angeles, or any other community in North America that wants to start capturing the benefits of this new technology.

做好准备。重新发明的厕所正在路上。

埃德·奥桑（Ed Osann）是自然资源国防委员会的国家用水效率，水倡议，健康人和繁荣社区计划的主管。该帖子最初发表在NRDC专家博客。