Bill Gates may have given up the chair at One, Microsoft Way, Redmond but he's not among the guys who can sit idle for long. The software billionaire turned social worker has launched a new initiative aimed at improving the health of the billions of people who have no safe, sanitary way to get rid of their waste."No innovation in the past 200 years has done more to save lives and improve health than the sanitation revolution triggered by invention of the toilet," Sylvia Mathews Burwell, president of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's global development program, said in an address at a conference in Kigali, Rwanda, according to a written statement released by the foundation. "But it did not go far enough. It only reached one-third of the world. What we need are new approaches."
To jump-start the effort, the foundation is ponying up $42 million in grants aimed at spurring innovation in the "capture and storage of waste." It will also work with local communities to end open defecation and boost access to "sanitation solutions."
What sorts of solutions are envisioned? The foundation is working to develop waterless toilets that do not rely on sewer connections and that might turn human waste into fertilizer, fuel, or even safe drinking water.
In one project the foundation is funding, a team from Stanford University is looking to build a system in Nairobi, Kenya, that would turn human waste into charcoal, the Seattle Times reported. And a Swiss team is working on a toilet that would turn urine into water used for cleaning.
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