New Plant Filtration System Turns Used Shower Water into Drinking Water

Recycling and Waste Management, Sustainable Products, Water and Water Conservation | Wednesday 9 September 2009 by Katrina Pfannkuch



Water recycling efforts can go way beyond the basic methods used today, according to a team of eco-thinkers and scientists who have derived a way to create fresh drinking water from shower water using a variety of plants.

Designers Jun Yasumoto, Vincent Vanderbrouk, Oliver Pigasse and Alban Le Henry settled on the shower basin concept when searching for creative and practical ways to recycle water. The eco-conscious team graduated from French national design school Ecole Nationale Supirieure de Creation Industrielle, and were especially interested in finding a way to make practical use of shower water, something normally filtered outside the home.

How does it work?

The concept/design for this eco-shower is based on a natural filtration process called phyto-purification, and helps to turn a bathroom into a mini-ecosystem. As you shower, the wastewater passes down into a chamber below the shower floor, and travels through a maze of filters including; sand, reeds, rushes, a mesh filter, water hyacinths, lemnas and a final carbon filter. The plants grow up and around the edge of the shower floor, and the filtration takes place at the root of the plants. Chemicals from soaps, shampoos and other debris are removed, and then the water is recycled back up for use in your next shower, or for brushing your teeth, washing your face or drinking.

‘With this project, we tried to combine the pleasure of taking a shower with the satisfaction of recycling water. We wanted the recycling process to actually interact with the use of the shower,” said Yasumoto.

The team hopes the impact of their concept doesn’t just alter the way we bathe. ‘We thought that by conceiving this very intricate relation between the recycling of water and the user experience, we could get the users to also re-think the way they use water,’ said Yasumoto.

The concept of a self-contained water filtration system is stirring up a lot of interest now that the images have been made public. As a result, the team is continuing to fine tune the idea and currently working on ways to bring it to market.

Now the question remains, how many people will actually want to use it?

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About the author: Katrina Pfannkuch is a writer, Reiki Master and entrepreneur who lives to write and create. She started Buzzword Communications to pursue her passion for excellence in communication and satisfy her entrepreneurial spirit.
source:GenGreen Life