Human Excreta and Food Waste of a Typical Rural Area in China: Characteristics and Co-Fermentation

Jean Joël Roland Kinhoun, Ao Li, Minghuan Lv, Yunpeng Shi, Bin Fan and Tingting Qian
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Jean Joël Roland Kinhoun: State Key Laboratory of Environmental Aquatic Chemistry, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100085, China
Ao Li: State Key Laboratory of Environmental Aquatic Chemistry, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100085, China
Minghuan Lv: State Key Laboratory of Environmental Aquatic Chemistry, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100085, China
Yunpeng Shi: State Key Laboratory of Environmental Aquatic Chemistry, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100085, China
Bin Fan: State Key Laboratory of Environmental Aquatic Chemistry, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100085, China
Tingting Qian: State Key Laboratory of Environmental Aquatic Chemistry, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100085, China

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 8, 1-13

Abstract: Human excreta (HE) and food waste (FW) are the primary contaminants in rural regions. Prior to treating these contaminants, mastering their properties is required. In this study, the characteristics of the HE leaving the body and FW leaving the kitchen to the subsequent respective fermentation were studied. Moreover, two kinds of co-fermentation processes for HE and FW were also investigated on the basis of mastering the properties. The results showed that, for a healthy adult, fresh feces, urine, and FW produced were about 163 g/cap/d (57.3 gCOD/cap/d), 1.6 L/cap/d (6.7 gN/cap/d), and 250 g/cap/d (35.0 gCOD/cap/d), respectively. In HE, about 75% of nitrogen and phosphorus were contained in urine. It takes at least three days for crushed FW discharged via water flushing to settle completely, and the COD removal efficiency after precipitation was around 75%. Mixing HE with FW after discharge, i.e., the initial unit of the process was 20% more efficient in fermentation than mixing after the respective pre-fermentation. This paper presents the characteristics of HE and FW and provides the optimized co-fermentation process, which provides technical support for the realization of environmental sanitation in rural areas.

Keywords: rural environment sanitation; toilet wastewater; food waste; property study; co-fermentation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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