PRACTICAL ORGANIC OPPORTUNITY PRODUCTION (POOP)
That’s right, we said it: POOP! Let’s talk about nutrient cycling.
Wasting waste is a relatively new process, and it’s super destructive for the planet. From the chemicals dumped into watersheds to the fossil fuel consumption powering plants, it’s an input-intensive practice.
Instead of nourishing plants with the nutrient cycle, we remove materials, add harsh treatment compounds, and release the results into watersheds. Now that practice is a waste!
Nature-based practices build soil health and water security, which build food security and circular economies.
Cute Piglets!
(Sustainable litter practices!)
These piglets are chowing down on green leafy snacks. They are demonstrating a successful pilot of a deep litter piggery system. This system is more efficient than the concrete wash-down pads and a better environment for the piglets. In fact, this nature-based system is so efficient it can absorb more liquid than the pigs can produce! That’s just fine by the piglets, because enjoying a nice wash with the barn hose is one of their favorite pastimes.
Standard gray-infrastructure piggery alternatives include wash-down systems, where the pigs stand on concrete pads and the waste is hosed off the floor. Even when these systems are diverted to septic tanks, the holding tanks are often overwhelmed and untreated water flows straight into coastal waterways.
In a deep litter system, not only is the composting-in-place deep layering method softer for the pigs to stand on, it’s less labor for the farmer. Layering in fresh surface layers that safely compost in place reduces the work hours, energy (human and fossil fuel) requirements, is better for the pigs, and protects groundwater. It’s a win in every dimension!
Chincoteague Ponies &
Protecting Virginia Waterways
Chincoteague island is famous for the barrier-island dwelling ponies of storied origins. The island has a long history of life on the water, including fishing, swimming, and boating on work and leisure watercraft of all kinds.
Coastal and island spaces often face challenges more similar to each other than to inland larger landmasses. High water tables, porous rocky or sandy soils and substrates mean there are rapid flowing connections between water treatment, groundwater, and coastal water. The gray infrastructure standardized in dense soils don’t work as well here, with pollutants and high nutrient loads escaping into the local waterways. We are working on a design collaboration for water treatment systems here that are appropriate for the nature of the barrier island. With nature-based practices, plants remove chemicals that pass through gray infrastructure systems untouched, nutrient loads are reduced to very low or undetectable levels. By building a nature-based green-gray hybrid water treatment, the water can safely and with no energy cost be reclaimed by nature’s own microbial processes to reuse standards, safely watering food forests, green fire breaks, and other vegetative practices.
Nature Based Solutions are Climate Resilient
This bioreactor garden system, built for the Parador Guánica 1929 in Puerto Rico, is still thriving five years after installation. Requiring no maintenance other than occasionally trimming back the verdant vegetation, the system treats water from the hotel. The vetiver grass works as a solar-powered pump, drawing off water volume with energy from the abundant sunshine. During weekdays, there is no outflow at all, the plants absorbing the entirety of the water volume into their root mass. During normal, non-holiday weekends, the treated water reaching the leach field is still minimal volume. The water is treated to a very high standard, far exceeding requirements. The system has continued to function through hurricanes and earthquakes. Nature-based solutions are highly climate resilient!
Syntropic Agroforestry
We all know entropy when we see it, the steady march toward chaos of even the most orderly system. Nature calls for a perspective shift, thinking about energy and processes that accumulate richness, rather than reduce over time. Commercial agriculture calls for additives in fertilizer, chemicals, and pesticides. Syntropic approaches are about building complex, dynamic, living systems that thrive working in tandem with each other, nature’s processes creating complexity and abundance.
In Puerto Rico, we are making progress planting an agroforestry buffer, encouraging thriving growth. These syntropic systems produce food, provide wildlife habitat, stabilize erosion, and grow healthier soils. Nature knows! We are part of the system, and can learn from the land and help the environment thrive.
Building a Better Bioreactor Garden
This past year, we’ve engaged in a number of testing processes, and the data are exciting! Not only do bioreactor gardens outperform septic systems, they reduce key nutrient levels to low or undetectable levels. But why stop there? We’ve progressed into designing systems for safe water reuse, based on the best scientific methods and building on traditional practices. We’ve had successful pilot practices for building these dynamic water treatment garden systems in Costa Rica, Hawaii, and Palau.
Reclaiming water resources stops throwing money and nutrients away, and supports sustainable, resource-secure communities and economies. Wastewater gray infrastructure systems were developed for public health in dense population centers, but the systems and standards are out of date. They require, and often don’t receive, frequent and expensive maintenance. Centralized wastewater treatment is energy and chemical intensive, and removes humans from the nutrient cycle.
People created a problem by treating what comes out of our bodies as waste rather than as part of the broader natural nutrient cycle. Now we’re leading with science, moving to address the aspects of our emissions that could be problematic (pharmaceuticals, bacteria, excess nutrients) toward a healthy, holistic system. These lower-cost, lower-carbon systems require no energy input to treat water to cleaner standards than any engineering alternative. Nature-based processes are traditional and future-proof, far more climate resilient than gray infrastructure solutions.
Awards
We are honored to have been recognized for making positive change in nature-based practices in several categories this year!
We were recognized as a finalist for the Global Water Changemaker awards by the UN and World Bank.
The IUCN Blue Natural Capital Financing Facility funded our wastewater work in Palau.
Grand Challenges Canada recognized our pioneering work on nature based wastewater management in Costa Rica with our partner Wildlife Conservation Association in Nosara.
We are honored and excited to be part of making waves for sustainable solutions!
Thankful for You!
Our work is made possible by the generous support of our donors and funders. You can be part of the change!
Every donation helps. You can support our operations and new research and development, or make a donation to a specific project or region. We work across the Pacific, Caribbean, and the Chesapeake Bay on the US East Coast.
You make innovation a reality as we turn funds into sustainable nature-based engineering solutions for people and the planet.
