General
Description
This open courseware course is an excerpt from Online Course on Faecal Sludge Management
For whom?
The course is designed for professionals who deal with planning, promoting, designing, operating or managing faecal sludge for residents in urban, peri-urban, slum or rural areas, in low income countries and beyond. A solid foundation in physics and chemistry is essential to follow this course; a good understanding of wastewater and its (biological) treatment will strongly support the understanding of the Module.
Learning Objectives
Upon completion, the participant should be able to:
- have an understanding of treatment, management, and planning aspects related to FSM;
- place FSM in a total urban water cycle approach;
- identify suitable treatment options for specific situations and locations;
- understand the mechanisms and designs of specific treatment technologies;
- communicate important aspects of FSM to managers and decision makers.
References
Pro-poor sanitation innovations
IHE DELFT and partners received an 8 million dollar grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The grant will be used to finance a 5-year capacity building and research project to stimulate local innovation on sanitation for the urban poor in sub-Saharan Africa and South-East Asia. Read more here about the project.
Books
Resources are published in this course.
Lecturer
Course materials are prepared by Mariska Ronteltap, Senior Lecturer in Sanitary Engineering, IHE DELFT.
Reference course:
Book release
The first book dedicated to Faecal Sludge Management (FSM) has been published recently by IWA Publishing. The book 'Faecal Sludge Management, systems approach for implementation and operation' as well as the individual chapters can be downloaded from this page. Damir Brdjanovic, Professor of Sanitary Engineering and Mariska Ronteltap, Senior Lecturer of Sanitary Engineering at IHE DELFT have edited the book, together with Dr. Linda Strande, director of the Excreta and Wastewater Management group at EAWAG (the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology). The book is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.
Summary
Over a billion people in urban and peri-urban areas of Africa, Asia, and Latin America are served by onsite sanitation technologies. Until now, the management of faecal sludge resulting from these onsite technologies has been grossly neglected. Financial resources are often lacking, and onsite sanitation systems tend to be regarded as temporary solutions until sewer-based systems can be implemented. However, the reality is that onsite sanitation is here to stay, either as an intermediate or permanent standalone solution, or in combination with sewer-based systems.
The appropriate and adequate management of faecal sludge deriving from onsite technologies is imperative for the protection of human and environmental health. This is the first book dedicated to faecal sludge management. It compiles the current state of knowledge of this rapidly evolving field, and presents an integrated approach that includes technology, management and planning. It addresses the planning and organization of the entire faecal sludge management service chain, from the collection and transport of sludge and treatment options, to the final enduse or disposal of treated sludge. In addition to providing fundamentals and an overview of technologies, the book goes into details of operational, institutional and fi nancial aspects, and provides guidance on how to plan a city-level faecal sludge management project with the involvement of all the stakeholders.
