Good evening BEST community,

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday break this past weekend. In an
effort to find less expensive alternative to modern fertilizers the city
of Amsterdam is planning on harvesting urine from public urinals to
create a fertilizer that can be used for traditional and rooftop
gardens. This seemingly radical idea aims to recycle the nutrients that
urine is rich with: mainly, phosphorus, nitrogen, and potassium.
Considering that today’s traditional fertilizers are based on limited
resources and are becoming increasingly more expensive, this is an
excellent way to help cull the wastefulness of our nutrient stream.

Waternet, the city’s water utility has plans to process urine into a
powdery substance known as struvite that can be applied as fertilizer to
gardens around the city. Construction has already begun on a processing
plant set to open in 2014. Projects predict that the pee collected
from a million people could produce 1,000 tonnes for fertilizer per
year. If successful Amsterdam could serve as a model for other cities
as they work on issues such as wastewater and nutrient cycling.
Have a great week,
Alec Shoelson

Public Urinals Help Amsterdam Harvest Pee as Fertilizer for Green Roofs
11/23/13
Beth Buczynski
http://inhabitat.com/public-urinals-help-amsterdam-harvest-pee-as-fertilizer-for-green-roofs/