‘Pee-Cycling’: One Way of Thinking Outside the Bowl
Cape towns consider the practical and the possible to reduce nitrogen
BY NICHOLAS MILLER, The Provincetown Independent | JUL 26, 2023
WELLFLEET — Kim Cobart of the Falmouth Pond Coalition stood in front of 40 people at the Wellfleet Adult Community Center on July 6 and told them about a potential solution to Cape Cod’s water pollution problem: pee-cycling.
The big pollution culprit is nitrogen, and there is a lot of nitrogen in urine.
According to the Conservation Law Foundation, “Nitrogen moves quickly from septic systems through the Cape’s uniquely porous soil and into local water bodies. It then acts like a fertilizer, causing massive algae outbreaks that threaten animal and plant species and can make the Cape’s bays unsafe for swimming, boating, and shellfish consumption.”
Otherwise known as urine diversion, pee-cycling separates urine from the flow of other wastewater so that it never enters the ground. What’s collected can then be turned into fertilizers.
To read the article in its entirety, including input from Barnstable County’s Massachusetts Alternative Septic System Test Center (MASSTC) staff members, visit ‘Pee-Cycling’: One Way of Thinking Outside the Bowl – The Provincetown Independent.
