Urinals have lost the need for water. Walk into a select Pennsylvania Turnpike restroom or the Taj Mahal in Arga, India and a Falcon Waterfree urinal will greet you without a handle to pull.
A traditional urinal or a toilet uses a trap to hold water between flushes. The trap (or water barrier) keeps smells from the waste line from entering back into the room. However a large amount of water is needed to push waste past the trap and purge it with each flush. A public restroom like one on the Pennsylvania Turnpike has a lot of people using it and creates a lot of waste water with a traditional toilet.
It takes a gallon of water to flush an average urinal. One waterless urinal can save about 40,000 gallons of water a year, Gorges said. In high traffic areas like airports, you’re looking at anywhere from 60,000 to 70,000 gallons a year for the single unit, he said.http://www.guampdn.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061010/NEWS01/61010014/1002
Some observations from Falcon's Web site:
--As much as 5% of fresh water consumed is currently used to carry away urine.
--Energy is saved in piping water and waste.
--Less energy needs be used to treat waste water, and it doesn’t produce carbon dioxide emissions as a byproduct of its treatment.
--Reducing the load on treatment plants; the need for expansion and overflow
--A Touch free toilet means less chance of spreading disease
--Eliminate the ammonia odor caused when urine reacts with water to cause ammonia oxide
http://www.falconwaterfree.com/
Another interesting toilet is the Clivus Multrum clivusmultrum.com composting toilet. The last time I checked there was one in use in along The North Central Railroad Trail in Freeland, Md. A water-free, oderless composting toilet system.
Fantastic ideas! With savings of tens of thousands of gallons/urinal/year, it's almost a crime not to install them --especially in areas where water is scarce.
While on the topic of saving water, here's a tip that anyone can do: before taking a shower, instead of letting the water go down the drain while waiting for it to warm up, put a bucket under the spout and use the cold water for watering house plants, household cleaning chores, etc.
Water conservation is something we don’t talk about much here in the east because there is such a plentiful supply, but go west of the Mississippi... into the desert of Nevada and Colorado... and they are fighting for water rights of the aquifers and rivers. I bet the concept of a water-free toilet is very exciting out there.