OFF GRID TOILET...when you don't use a flushing toilet this is what you risk.
3 Disease from sewage
Disease-causing germs can be spread from sewage if it is not disposed of properly or if people do not practise proper toilet hygiene (cleanliness). If a sewage disposal system is not properly maintained it will not be able to get rid of the sewage safely.
Diseases caused by germs:
Bacterial:
salmonellosis
shigellosis
diarrhoea
trachoma
melioidosis
Viral:
gastroenteritis
hepatitis A
Diseases caused by parasites:
giardiasis
dwarf tapeworm infection
threadworm infection
hookworm infection
strongyloidasis
These disease-causing germs and parasites can be spread directly by people coming into contact with sewage or toilet waste. This can happen, for example, when people walk through sewage which has leaked onto the ground, coming into contact with animals such as flies and cockroaches which carry the germs and parasites in or on their bodies. Dogs and cats can carry germs and parasites too drinking water which has been contaminated by sewage
This is a list of some of the conditions which make it easy for direct or indirect spread of germs and parasites from sewage:
Not washing hands after going to the toilet.
Fig. 2.1: Not washing your hands after going to the toilet helps spread germs to food.
Fig. 2.1: Not washing your hands after going to the toilet helps spread germs to food.
Sewage or effluent collecting in pools as a result of an overflowing sewage lagoon or broken sewage pipes. This sewage and effluent contains disease-causing germs and parasites and allows mosquitoes to breed
Uncovered or broken septic tanks which allow effluent to escape, meaning that people or pets can directly be exposed.
Blocked, overflowing toilets which make it easy for children to come into contact with germs.
Leach drains from septic tanks which are too close to drinking water supplies so that effluent soaks through the soil into the water supply
Going "off grid" can be a very dangerous thing. If you're contemplating doing it, take a look at a 3rd world country and you will see real off grid. (I amended this part to make it a little clearer for those that suffer from a biased attitude)People in these counties have come up with some of the BEST ideas about off grid life and maintaining them with little to no support from governments or NGO's. Most people think that it's not the same thing however, just because you have a few shiny solar panels and rainwater tank and live it the 1st world, it doesn't mean you wont have exactly the same problems.
Taking children "off grid" is quite irresponsible in (some cases) and depending on where you live you may get a visit from child protective services (Australia) , who are likely to remove your children from you.
Do you really want to risk loosing your kids. I sure wouldn't.
Thank you for taking the time to read this post.
This post is primarily directed at Australians. If you are not Australian and have learned something I and happy to have helped, however you will need to insure that some things are relevant to your country.
Please resteem as it may just save a life or the destruction of a family.
Regards
THL
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Hi - as another offgridder' I am now following you :-) Currently in the Spanish mountains but thinking of Ozarks or North East California. Any tips on these locations? I will be making more off grid style posts soon too :-)
I'm not really an off gridder mate i'm only off grid until my homestead is built and then i'm hooking straight to the grid. Much cheaper and much less work. Don't want to spend all day just trying to get the basics done . Need all the day light i can get to do farming. As for location you couldn't get me to go to America to save my life . Place is mad with guns and to many people willing to use the. Im Australian and as far as i'm concerned there is no better place in the world.
followed you back to
Not sure where the spanish mountains are mate but if there in Span I would stay there much sooner than going to the US...just my opinion though. Be careful going off grid its not the romantic dream all those Americans would have you believe. There just glorifying it to make some money on you tube and the like. Best of luke though cheers
THL
Thanks for the reply. Yes, I've been off grid for 7 years and it's not glamorous or easy.....but gives me piece of mind. Others also said stay in Spain and not to goto USA........what would be your reasons of this? Coming FEMA martial law or dollar collapse or other? Thanks.
its full of Americans...lol just a Joke..... America in my opinion is not a good place. TV lies about almost everything about America. Coming FEMA martial law, that's all american paranoia, that's what happens when you eat too much junk food watch to much tv and let everyone run around with guns. Literally half the country is on antidepressants just to be able to cope with their on reality. Coming dollar collapse...yep that one is going to happen for sure. Things like Steemit will see to that. Dollar collapse alone is reason not to go there. Mate you want a new place to live come to Australia. Perth,Sydney or Melbourn are the best.
oh and why do I say Australia...well because we are one of the few counties left where people leave you alone to get on with your life and we still trust each other enough to have a good life and not get killed or screwed over and we are the MOST successful multicultural country in the world.Plus the government gives everyone money if you don't have any...lol beet that America. : o)
lol yeah off grid is far from all it's cracked up to be. I love it, but you have hit the nail on the head here - the worst part is the once a year sorting out the septic tank. Only takes an hour or so, but geez. No way the dunny truck would make it down our driveway though, so you do what you gotta do.
lol yep i'm going have the same problem at my place when she's up and running. I got 40 acres out in the Western Downs . The post is more for all of those people that are glorifying doing it as a way to rebell against the system. You probably seen all those American off gridders pumping all that crap out on you tube just to make add cents. I get the feeling that a kid is going to get severely injured or even kill from all that silliness and then BAM their government will step in and shut it all down.and you know what that means...we get the new rules to, that's the way it goes..then you and me loose what we got because of some silly bugger on the other side of the world cocked up.
Bloody preppers ... tell you what, if the zombie apocalypse comes, the shotgun and spam will come in handy, but people are going to be too busy getting chewed to give a crap about your stash of gold.
lmao....I'm liken you more with every comment . So bloody refreshing to hear a straight talking Aussie for a change . All these left wing princesses are enough to make a man break the no slapping people rules. People often ask me why I want to live in the middle of nowhere and homestead. They say "are you afraid of the world and go hiding to protect yourself" and i always say, no i do it to protect you from me, because i'm worried that one morning I will get out of bed on the wrong side and all you politically correct snowflakes are going to get the biggest ass kicken they have seen since the the pom's took back the Falkland Islands .
Over a decade and my septic tank has never needed emptying, never caused me problems and I live in a third world country and I love my country. Maybe your septic tank doesn't have the right "balance"?
I don't think you understand the reason why people are going "off-grid" in the first place. Systems of dependency can and will fail you. What happens when the grid fails, for whatever reason? The public sanitation dept. have no redundancy to guarantee the very things you just mentioned in the post won't happen. I'm originally from Wisconsin, USA. A smaller town in the north, Rhinelander experienced failures in just one pump in their sewage system and it contaminated over 5,000 homes that had to be expensively sanitized before the owners could get occupancy again. So, depending on power to always be available isn't a guaranteed strategy to avoid nasty diseases that untreated human waste can possess.
Composting toilets, however, are very sanitary. In fact, they accomplish the very same process that ALL public sanitation systems do. They efficiently break down human waste through heat and Ultra Violet light exposure and then return the surplus nutrients back to the soil. Do some investigating into where the "sanitized" waste goes when the sanitation departments are done with it. You'll find that it goes into your rivers and onto your farm fields. Off-griders are just cutting out the middle man and doing it them self so that they are not dependent on outside systems of support.
As for your point of Child Protective Services being called on families who choose to be self-sufficient and safely recycle their own waste, what proof do you have of that ever being done? If that was the case, all children in all underdeveloped countries would have to be taken away from their families since most of these third world nations don't even utilize composting technology. I've been to Juarez, Mexico where raw sewage is running in the ditches. It's a city of a population over 1 million people, the vast majority without indoor plumbing. Missionary agencies are actually teaching the people of Juarez to install and use composting toilets.
So, I don't understand your animosity towards those who would like to go "off-grid." I personally am on-grid, but have a composting toilet on the standby in case power ever goes out for longer than I have fuel to run my generator.
Cheers mate!
ok...im only replying out of respect, because everything you just said, made want to take a nap.
First... You made the "typical"( that so many Americans do) mistake of assuming that the post was directed at Americans only. If Americans do get something from the post, all good and well. Its a big world and I'm not American. I'm Australian, that is who the post is primarily directed at. Here in AUSTRALIA, the government can , have and will take your kids away from you if you do not supply the correct sanitation facilities, or any other reason they deem sufficient for that matter. The majority of my follower,subscribers,reader, viewers are AUSTRALIAN. Here in AUSTRALIA, we have many floods, especially in Queensland where I am. We have built "our" sanitary systems to cope with this and that makes it extraordinarily infrequent that there is any kind of malfunction. We have had shut downs but never of more than a few days , and when it does happen the government leaps into action and systematically distributes portable ablution units widely. Yes I am well aware that a large portion of Americans think your county is about to burst into flames at any moment. However I do not agree with that at all. You as Americans, may suffer the odd occasion that your systems go offline and having a backup is clearly a good idea. Australia will never and I meen never have a systematic collapse of primary support mechanisms. We would have to be hit by a bloody asteroid for that to happen. Our systems are new and very well maintained.
Second...Do you really believe that every person that goes "off Grid" in America is a sensible and responsible person that can actually proved the necessary systems to which you speak of ? I don't think so.
Third...I spent a great deal of time in 3rd world countries in south east asia doing Aid work and they have some of the BEST off grid systems I have ever seen. Again as an American you "assume" too much by inferring that people in 3rd world countries are backwards. Shame on you for that. By what you said about where the effluent goes in your county is sounds like your government is irresponsible (another season I am so happy I live in Australia) as here in Australia we put the waste through very stringent methods of removing contaminants from the water. You could almost drink it, though I would not recommend it.
Finally...I have a 40 acre farm that... IS... off grid at the moment, as its under construction. I don't have any animosity towards just anyone who goes off grid, I have animosity for fools that go off grid and bring harm to themselves, others and the environment. Going off grid just because the power or water may get shut off one day is exactly the same as a farmer that doesn't use his horse to plow his fields because it will die one day. Same logic. If I spent all my time worrying about what "if" situations I would never be able to take advantage of the what IS situations. Your country is being systematically regressed into atrophy as a mechanism to remove your participation in the next great leap forward for human civilisation, by making you all believe exiting all that your ancestors have built is worthless and/or not to be trusted or relied upon. I personally love the grid and all the great thing it lets me do, and all the time it save me to enjoy all the great things in life there are to do. Bugger spending all day working my guts out just to get the basics done, but if by some extraordinarily narrow chance that the grid does go down, I have a very good brain and a very capable family that will overcome any such adversity without missing a beat.
One day it will be time for my children to go forward and do their part, offering Aid services to the 3rd world, unfortunately i fear that 3rd would county will be America. Not because your government did it , rather because you all did it to yourselves voluntarily. Hows that grab yu... as some food for thought. ; o)
Cheers.....Mate !
I live off grid, never had any problems with my toilet waste, in ten years it was never emptied. I'm an Asian guy in a third world country. I resent people being mandated to pay for sewage systems, because I'm libertarian. Seems like a big monopolistic scam.