num_pages: 264
description: Grossly ambitious and rooted in scientific scholarship The Other Dark Matter shows how human excrement can be a life-saving money-making resourceif we make better use of it.The average person produces about four hundred pounds of excrement a year. More than seven billion people live on this planet. Holy crap!Because of the diseases it spreads we have learned to distance ourselves from our waste but the long line of engineering marvels weve created to do sofrom Roman sewage systems and medieval latrines to the immense computerized treatment plants we use todayhas also done considerable damage to the earths ecology. Now scientists tell weve been wasting our waste. When recycled correctly this resource cheap and widely available can be converted into a sustainable energy source act as an organic fertilizer provide effective medicinal therapy for antibiotic-resistant bacterial infection and much more.In clear and engaging prose that draws on her extensive research and interviews Lina Zeldovich documents the massive redistribution of nutrients and sanitation inequities across the globe. She profiles the pioneers of poop upcycling from startups in African villages to innovators in American cities that convert sewage into fertilizer biogas crude oil and even life-saving medicine. She breaks taboos surrounding sewage disposal and shows how hygienic waste repurposing can help battle climate change reduce acid rain and eliminate toxic algal blooms. Ultimately she implores us to use our innate organic power for the greater good. Dont just sit there and let it go to waste.
language: English
title: The Other Dark Matter: The Science and Business of Turning Waste into Wealth and Health
publisher: University of Chicago Press