Christoph Lüthi

Emerging solutions to the water challenges of an urbanizing world

The top priorities for urban water sustainability include the provision of safe drinking water, wastewater handling for public health, and protection against flooding. However, rapidly aging infrastructure, population growth, and increasing urbanization call into question current urban water management strategies, especially in the fast-growing urban areas in Asia and Africa. We review innovative approaches in urban water management with the potential to provide locally adapted, resource-efficient alternative solutions. Promising examples include new concepts for stormwater drainage, increased water productivity, distributed or on-site treatment of wastewater, source separation of human waste, and institutional and organizational reforms. We conclude that there is an urgent need for major transdisciplinary efforts in research, policy, and practice to develop alternatives with implications for cities and aquatic ecosystems alike.

Community-based approaches for addressing the urban sanitation challenge

Urban sanitation presents one of the most significant service delivery challenges related to poverty alleviation and sustainable development in the developing world. The past decade has witnessed innovations in service delivery approaches for unserved rural and urban settlements with a clear policy shift to community-based approaches that attempt to overcome the supply-led, over-engineered sanitation solutions of the past decades. This article presents two examples of new developments: the urban-focussed household-centred environmental sanitation (HCES) and the rural-focussed community-led total sanitation (CLTS) approaches. The internationally renowned CLTS approach has achieved considerable success since its introduction, by harnessing community and small private sector capacity to solve sanitation problems locally. Experience with validation of the HCES approach in a variety of urban sites in Africa, Asia and Latin America is presented in the second part of the article highlighting some of the lessons learned. The article closes by arguing that a combination of HCES and CLTS, two field-tested methodologies, has the potential to improve the sustainability of sanitation service interventions.

Looking beyond technology: an integrated approach to water, sanitation and hygiene in low income countries

Reference EPFL-ARTICLE-202332doi:10.1021/es501645dView record in Web of Science Record created on 2014-10-23, modified on 2016-08-09

Opportunities and limits to market-driven sanitation services: evidence from urban informal settlements in East Africa

The improvement of sanitation conditions in slums(1) is difficult in part because of economic and institutional environments that often prevent private or public investment in infrastructure. This analysis of sanitation conditions in informal settlements in Nairobi and Kampala compares user practices. It also identifies the main actors involved in the provision of overlapping sanitation systems, involving a multitude of small-scale providers, along with the challenges these present. The paper goes on to describe a new market-based approach in Nairobi, developed by a social enterprise, Sanergy, which is responsible for the construction of facilities and the collection and treatment of wastes. The system improves user satisfaction, community wellbeing and environmental quality, pointing to a clear opportunity for such market-based interventions where a customer base already pays for sub-standard services. There remain challenges, however, around the ability to scale up and finance these providers, especially in complex operating environments that increase transactional costs for companies.

The Household-Centred Environmental Sanitation approach

Too often, standardized groupings of sanitation and treatment technologies are imposed in situations where they may not be appropriate. The Household-Centred Environmental Sanitation (HCES) approach instead emphasizes that the needs and means of households should be put first, and a collaborative process involving all stakeholders should steer the planning process.

Slum inhabitants’ perceptions and decision-making processes related to an innovative sanitation service: evaluating the Blue Diversion Toilet in Kampala (Uganda)

The inadequate provision of sanitation in informal urban settlements, also known as slums, continues to be an important issue. New technologies and services are being designed to solve this problem. However, the history of failed sanitation programmes and projects highlights a lack of understanding of how slum inhabitants decide on investing in such products and services. In this paper, we gather perspectives from potential clients and investigate how slum inhabitants (1) perceive the current situation and whether they desire improvements of sanitation, (2) how they evaluate a new toilet that is still in development, and how (3) social processes and (4) constraints affect decisions. Data were collected through interviewing 1538 people within a general household survey. People using shared and public latrines desire an improvement of their sanitation facilities. The lack of water for washing is perceived by residents as a the biggest problem when accessing current latrines. The new toilet was mostly evaluated positively: people like it, expect large health benefits from it and it complies with cultural norms. However, people also expect some problems with the functioning of the toilet and expect opposition to pay for the service, due to the high costs and a lack of space to set up new toilets.

Inclusion of shared sanitation in urban sanitation coverage? Evidence from Ghana and Uganda

This paper discusses the notions of ‘improved’ and ‘unimproved’ sanitation in the context of developing countries in urbanizing Africa and considers the role that shared facilities can play in this equation. It analyses current definitions and classifications used by the United Nations Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) to monitor access to shared sanitation and summarizes the recent discourse on JMPs limitations. Empirical evidence from two case studies in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) - Kampala, Uganda and Ashaiman, Ghana - is presented, showing the widespread use and limitations of the shared toilet facilities in these two cities. The empirical evidence shows that quite different types of shared sanitation facilities emerge in different cities, each influenced by the urbanization patterns, local politics and sociocultural considerations. Improving the quality of shared facilities involves the consideration of the applicability of the different types of facilities within the category ‘shared sanitation’, toge...

Towards Sustainable Sanitation in an Urbanising World

Urban sanitation in low‐ and middle‐income countries is at an inflection point. It is increasingly acknowledged that conventional sewer‐based sanitation cannot be the only solution for expanding urban areas. There are other objective reasons apart from the lack of capital. The lack of stable energy supplies, of spare parts and of human resources for reliable operation, and the increasing water scarcity are factors that seriously limit the expansion of centralised systems. This chapter argues that a new paradigm for urban sanitation is possible, if the heterogeneity within developing cities is reflected in the implementation of different sanitation systems, adapted to each urban context and integrated under one institutional roof. This new paradigm entails: (1) innovative management arrangements; (2) increased participation and the integration of individ‐ ual, community and private sector initiatives; (3) thinking at scale to open new opportunities; (4) improved analysis of the situation and awareness raising. Moving beyond conventional approaches towards sustainable urbanisation needs to follow both a top‐down and a bottom‐up approach, with proper incentives and a variety of sanitation systems which, in a future perspective, will become part of the ‘urban ecosystem’.

Urban sanitation technology decision-making in developing countries: a critical analysis of process guides

Planning for urban sanitation in developing contexts is one of the major development challenges of this century. Particularly, the relevance of a broad perspective in sanitation decision-making processes has been increasingly discussed. One possible contribution to achieve comprehensive decisions is through the use of planning guidelines, also called process guides. The present work first identified categories of relevant decision elements, namely: (a) the multi-sectoral approach, (b) the multiplicity of sustainable dimensions, (c) the system analysis perspective and (d) the co-existence of planning scales. Then, for each category, a comparative analysis of urban sanitation process guides was conducted with a focus on technology decision-making. It was found that the importance of considering those categories is increasingly reflected in process guides, although not always in a detailed supportive way. Recommendations are provided to increase the added value of process guides regarding technology selection, as well as, to better integrate them into urban planning.

Ecohealth Approach to Urban Waste Management: Exposure to Environmental Pollutants and Health Risks in Yamoussoukro, Côte d’Ivoire

Poor waste management is a key driver of ill-health in urban settlements of developing countries. The current study aimed at assessing environmental and human health risks related to urban waste management in Yamoussoukro, the political capital of Côte d’Ivoire. We undertook trans-disciplinary research within an Ecohealth approach, comprised of a participatory workshop with stakeholders and mapping of exposure patterns. A total of 492 randomly selected households participated in a cross-sectional survey. Waste deposit sites were characterised and 108 wastewater samples were subjected to laboratory examinations. The physico-chemical parameters of the surface water (temperature, pH, conductivity, potential oxidise reduction, BOD5, COD, dissolved oxygen, nitrates, ammonia and total Kendal nitrogen) did not comply with World Health Organization standards of surface water quality. Questionnaire results showed that malaria was the most commonly reported disease. Diarrhoea and malaria were associated with poor sanitation. Households having dry latrines had a higher risk of diarrhoea (odds ratio (OR) = 1.8, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.2–2.7) compared to latrines with septic tanks and also a higher risk for malaria (OR = 1.9, 95% (CI) 1.1–3.3). Our research showed that combining health and environmental assessments enables a deeper understanding of environmental threats and disease burdens linked to poor waste management. Further study should investigate the sanitation strategy aspects that could reduce the environmental and health risks in the study area.