Watch Bill Gates Drink Water That Was Once Human Poop

Bottoms up. Billionaire activist Bill Gates recently put his advocacy work where his mouth is when he drank a cup of water that was once human poop. "The water tasted as good as any I’ve had out of a bottle," Gates wrote in a blog post on his eponymous site. "And having studied the engineering behind it, I would happily drink it every day. It’s that safe." The Microsoft co-founder has long been committed to bringing clean water to the 700 million people who lack it and this latest innovation could be key in solving the issue. Across the globe, 1 billion people still defecate in the open, an issue that can lead to a number of debilitating conditions, including diarrheal disease -- which is the second leading cause of death of children under 5. Areas with latrines but no modern sewage systems are also at high risk. There, truckers dump human waste in the nearest river, ocean or at a treatment facility that doesn’t treat the sewage, Gates wrote. The contaminated feces then ends up in the water supply. Because it's complicated and expensive to introduce Western toilets to these developing countries, Gates is putting his faith in innovative projects like the Omniprocessor, which converts poop into drinking water. Designed and built by Janicki Bioenergy, a Seattle engineering firm, the machine burns human waste to produce electricity and water. The processor powers itself through the use of a steam engine and because it runs at such a high temperature, the H2O...
Source: Science - The Huffington Post - Category: Science Source Type: news