The Living Machine

1. The Living Machine By: Meredith and Leah

2. Main Goal • The main goal of the living machine is to be a sustainable alternative to conventional waste disposal. • It also provides an educational opportunity from its simulation of ecosystems. http://www.dewcorp.com

3. FACTS • Everyday two million tons of human waste is disposed of in water courses • Less then 1% of the water supply is available for human consumption. • In developing nations, 90% of sewage is dumped untreated into usable water supplies. • 1.2 billion people do not have access to safe drinking water • More then 25,000 people die each day from water related illnesses.

4. Traditional systems • Traditional systems: • Use environmentally harmful chemicals • Create toxic sludge • Are energy intensive • And often dispose improperly of toxic sludge www.worstedwitch.com

5. “Making a Difference” • Can provide cost effective onsite treatment systems to prevent waste from polluting rivers and other water sources. • Can be installed in places where traditional treatment plants are not able to go • Reduces the need to draw on precious water supplies for such things as irrigation and toilet flushing • Economic potential in methane gas production and cultivation of plants able to grow in solutions provided by the machine

6. What it does • The living machine takes wastewater and purifies it to a point where it can be directly discharged into waterways or can be recycled • It does so by utilizing a set of created ecologies • Each system is designed specifically depending on the type of wastewater it will treat. http://www.livingmachines.com/

7. How it works • Anaerobic settling tank – this tank allows solids to fall out of the wastewater and sink to the bottom allowing it to become clearer. • A Biofilter of bark and other soil-like materials –this is the first filtration and first step to help reduce the odor • Photosynthetic algae tank –fix oxygen back into the water and provide organic food (dead algae) for respiration

8. How it works cont’d • Higher plants (typically water hyacinth) in aerobic tanks grow in a nutrient solution -provide a stable environment for microbes and remove heavy metals from the water. • Microbes are an ideal source of food for plankton which are ideal sources for filter feeding fish • This creates the ability for detritus-feeding fish to be added in later tanks so they may consume the larger sections of the treated sludge.

10. Technological obstacles • Most living machines require a greenhouse or other structure to protect it from colder weather. • Minimal exposure to the environment so it has been unable to become a true ecosystem with natural selection and self-design and management.

11. Political/Economic obstinacies • The psychological effect of being able to drink your own wastewater. • Traditional wastewater treatments have been embedded into our economy. • The living system could have difficulty breaking through the mass scale of traditional systems. • Costly to construct

12. Negative environmental impacts • If pollution occurs it is due to improper or incomplete design of the Living Machine

13. References • http://www.context.org/ICLIB/IC35/Guterson.htm • http://www.rps.psu.edu/0009/machine.html • http://www.rain-barrel.net/living-machine.html • http://www.oceanarks.org/ • http://www.toddecological.com/ecomachines.html