In 2016 the Royal Netherlands Army invited business and science to come up with ideas on reducing the environmental footprint of military bases. This year, after having tested the best ideas, the army will sent a 20-feet container to its base in Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan. Developed by Pure-Tech a sister company of Jotem Water treatment, this sophisticated purification unit uses X-Flow membrane technology to turn toilet waste into clean water and energy.
As part of a defense program called Smart Base, a field lab in the Netherlands was first set up to test the practical value of innovative solutions aimed at significant reductions in water and energy consumption. Any successful solution has to be robust and reliable to be useful in a military setting. With a view to the complexity of earlier systems tested by the army, there was some initial doubt among experts about the viability of the ‘Power up your poop’-concept developed by Pure-Tech.
