I met Mr. Vijendra of Kontact Engineers, Chennai during the recently concluded "Climate Change and its Mitigation - A serious issue for SMEs" conference, by TFSC/TANSTIA at the Raintree Hotel, Alwarpet. Along with their renewable energy product portfolio (that includes innovative micro-wind turbines, solar thermal parabolic collection system, BIPV flexible roofing solar panels, etc), he introduced me to an interesting product that his company is dealing with - Kupple Water-less Urinals (in partnership with AG Aqua Solutions).
Often, we focus so much on generating electricity but forget about saving energy/optimizing its utilization. Remember that every unit of saved energy is as valuable as every unit of generated energy. In fact, saved energy is more valuable because every unit we consume requires about five units to be produced at source (taking transmission losses/equipment inefficiencies into consideration).
A water-less urinal saves water and hence, also the electricity that is required to pump the water to the overhead tank. Over a long period of time (like one year), the amount of water saved and hence the amount of energy saved, is considerable.
A water-less urinal saves water and hence, also the electricity that is required to pump the water to the overhead tank. Over a long period of time (like one year), the amount of water saved and hence the amount of energy saved, is considerable.
Kontact Engineers estimates the water savings for one year (for a facility comprised of 100 males) to be 3.65,000 liters. They also calculate that approximately 1.96 units of electricity is used to pump up 1000 liters of water on a three-story building. Hence, in our case 715 units of electricity can be saved every year!
Let us look at some highlights of the Kupple Water-less Urinals (as mentioned in their product brochure):
- The surface of the urinal is glazed using a special chemical which makes it hydro-phobic. That is, it doesn't allow urine/liquid to stay on the surface and will push it down the drain.
- Anti-bacterial coating doesn't allow bacteria/pathogens to survive on the surface.
- Odor is controlled as urine flows quickly through the NRV (Non-Returning Valve) and the vapors are arrested there.
- No water is required for flushing purpose - that eliminates water fittings/pipeline, etc.
- They claim that the urinal is maintenance free and no stains will form on the surface.
- Since cartridges are not used, there is no maintenance cost - wrt. materials and man-power.
As you can expect, the initial cost of the water-less urinal is higher than normal urinals. It's a separate product and existing urinals cannot be converted into this type of water-less urinal (unlike cartridge based ones).
The company however provides a five-year warranty and an additional trap with each unit (as per their brochure). For further information, you can contact - kontactengineers.chn@gmail.com.
Disclaimer: Please note that this is not a paid article. It has been published solely because the administrator thinks that this info might be useful for companies/organizations. All the information provided above were taken from the company/product brochure received by email and hence readers are requested to double-check all info/get additional details from the vendor, before deciding to buy.
An excellent doc/resource on water-less urinals has been published by IIT Delhi - Read it from here.
