Plastic Enclosures Provide a Cheap, Bacteria-Based Sewage Solution
Poo Lagoon These "Poo-Gloos," which normally rest on the bottom of a wastewater pond, await installation. Bacteria living in the domes break down contaminates into compounds such as carbon dioxide. Aerators within them keep oxygen flowing to the microbes. Wastewater Compliance SystemsBioDomes could safely rid rural areas of wastewater Roughly 7,000 rural communities in the U.S. deal with sewage the old-fashioned way: by dumping it into an open holding pond and letting sunlight and bacteria do the rest. Not only do these ponds smell bad, but it takes the bacteria a long time to render the sewage nonhazardous, a situation that could pose a contamination risk to waterways. Wastewater-treatment plants, the most common solution, cost upward of $2 million to build, according to Kraig Johnson, the chief technology officer of Salt Lake City-based Wastewater Compliance Systems. Johnson, who researched biological solutions for sewage treatment at the University of Utah, is pilot-testing...