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Source: Reuters
Researchers Dr Dyllon Randall, Suzanne Lambert and Vukheta
Mukhari stand with a bio-brick made from urine at the University
of Cape Town, in Cape Town
Dr Dyllon Randall holds a bio-brick made from urine at the
University of Cape Town, in Cape Town
Researcher Suzanne Lambert sits beside a bio-brick made from
urine at the University of Cape Town
The grey bricks are produced in a lab over eight days using
urine, calcium, sand and bacteria. Fertilizers are also produced
during the processes. And no, the bricks do not smell.
The bricks are made using urea -- a chemical found naturally in
urine and also synthesized around the world to make fertilizer.
The process of growing bricks from urea has been tested in the
United States with synthetic solutions, but the new brick uses
real human urine for the first time, the researchers said.
"We literally pee this away every day and flush it through the
sewer networks," said Dyllon Randall, a senior lecturer at the
University of Cape Town's civil engineering department who is
part of the team that developed the brick. "Why not recover this
instead and make multiple products?"
The bio-bricks are created through a process called microbial
induced carbonate precipitation, which is similar to the process
that naturally produces coral reefs.
Loose sand is colonized with bacteria that produce the enzyme
urease. The enzyme breaks down the urea in urine, while
producing the rocky substance calcium carbonate through a
complex chemical reaction.
A brick or column of any shape can be made. The bricks are
formed at room temperature, cutting the harmful carbon dioxide
emitted when making regular bricks that are kiln-fired.
One obstacle preventing mass production: the bricks use huge
amounts of pee. To make a single brick requires about 20 liters
of urine - a couple of weeks' worth of wee for a typical adult.
"So, I get it from the boys bathroom opposite the laboratory. I
put a little sign up and all the university boys contribute to
my research," said Suzanne Lambert, who proved the concept for
the research by making the first brick.
"I definitely see commercialization in the next decade or two,
but there is still a lot of lab work to be done," she said.
(Editing by James Macharia and Peter Graff)
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