Eco-bricks made from pee take number one (for real)

[ensho]

http://www.grist.org/article/2010-05-12-eco-bricks-made-from-pee-take-number-one


Sometimes it feels like climate change has us all up against a brick wall.

Then some innovator pisses all over those fears by cooking up a formula for eco-bricks that don't need cooking -- thus, saving millions of tons of CO2 each year. And she does it all with some sand, germs, salt, and pee (urea, actually). Just mix it up, skip the baking, and you go from (sort-of) kidney stones to sandstone in a jiffy.

These eco-bricks made from number one took number one (and $25,000) in Metropolis Magazine's Next Generation Design Competition. American architect Ginger Krieg Dosier, working as an assistant professor in Abu Dhabi, engineered this brilliant brick formula.
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saving millions of tons of CO2 from going into the air!

what a great idea. hope it comes into fruition.

[rzemanfl]

1. Any mention of kidney stones makes my dick hurt-painful

memories. What happens to the germs once the brick is done?

[1620rock]

2. Actually urin is nearly sterile.

[rzemanfl]

8. The article says germs are part of the recipe. n/t

[kestrel91316]

3. The world is not sterile. Building materials are not sterile. Pee IS virtually sterile

when it comes out and any germs that grow in it afterward are just ordinary stuff found in every square inch of the world we live in, lol.

As somebody with a BS in Microbiology, I just laugh at all the germ phobia out there among those with no background in the field.......my sister included.

[rzemanfl]

9. See above. I was just wondering what happened to the microbes

after their brick making work was done.

[kestrel91316]

11. Who cares? If heat was used in the brickmaking, that would kill them.

If not, maybe the pH of the stuff killed them, maybe not.

But any microbes that would grow in urine after its exit from the body are just environmental contaminants and of no concern. They ARE why we wash hands with soap and water before eating and preparing food, lol.

[formercia]

4. Wash your hands before you pee

and your pee will be pristine as newly-fallen snow.

[FedUpWithIt All]

5. Old cottages all over Europe were made using materials that contained urine and/or manure

Both wattle and daub and cob include urine/manure as stabilizers in many of the mixture recipes. Both methods of building have no requirement for heating the materials other than natural air drying and the buildings last for hundreds of years in a variety of climates.

[Maru Kitteh]

6. So it's more rediscovery than innovation? Interesting!

Either way, it sounds like a helpful development.

[11 Bravo]

7. K&R just for the thread title.

[Liberal_in_LA]

10. cool