Indian Railways develops Hybrid Vacuum Toilets

Indian Railways has developed a Hybrid Vacuum Toilet design which combines the advantages of Vacuum toilets and those of Biotoilets.
The first of its kind system in the world has been developed by the Development Cell of Indian Railway Board. This newly developed toilet facility has been fitted on trial basis in Dibrugarh Rajdhani.

Features of Hybrid Vacuum Toilet

• The prototype of Hybrid Vacuum Toilet consists two parts of a custom designed Vacuum toilet and a biodigester tank.
• The vacuum toilet has been adapted from a commercially available systems used in aircrafts.
• These toilets evacuate its discharge into a biodigester tank of the biotoilets which is fitted underneath the train coach of Indian Railways which does not need large space.
• The biodigester tank contains anaerobic bacteria that convert human faecal matter into water and small amount of gases (including methane) by the process of hydrolysis, acetogenesis, acidogenesis and methanogenesis.
• Advantages: It will help to maintain hygiene and cleanliness in toilets or tracks of Indian Railways as there will no direct evacuation of human waste.
• Vacuum toilet also saves water as it consumes only 500 Milliliters of water for flushing compared to typical conventional toilet or Biotoilet which uses 10-15 liters of water per flush.

Month: Current Affairs - September, 2015