AN IMPROVED PROCESS FOR CONVERTING HUMAN EXCREMENT INTO FUEL AND MANURE
Year: 1870

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Alexandre Bobrownicki and
Alfred Didier Marie Mesnard. at the Office of the Commissioners
of Patents, with their Petition, on the 26th February 1870.
We, ALEXANDRE BOBROWNICKI, of Paris, Civil Engineer, and ALFRED
DIDIER MARIE MESNARD, Viscounte de Chousy, of Commune d'Orchaise,
in the Department of Loir-et-Cher, both in the Empire of France,
do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "AN IMPROVED
PROCESS FOR CONVERTING HUMAN EXCREMENT INTO FUEL AND MANURE," to
be as follows :-
This Invention consists in manufacturing human excrements into fuel
and manure by the following processes:-
The principle of this Invention is based on facts heretofore observed
and proved on many occasions by mixing human excrements with
bodies rich in carbon, such as charcoal, anthracite, coal, and other
substances which when mixed together under certain conditions the
excrements undergo the following changes :—
First. The charcoal disinfects them with more force than sulphate
of iron or zinc, or any other method hitherto employed for that
purpose.

page_text: ordinary temperature either in the open air or in an enclosed vessel.
The hypothesis of this substitution is based on the following
results:
First. Human excrements when subjected to combustion while
burning emit an abundant amount of smoke with the smell of burnt
horn, which is manifested by the decomposition of the biliary and
albuminous matters.
Secondly. Human excrements when mixed with charcoal and after-
wards rapidly dried burn with much less smoke, but still emit the same
smell.
Thirdly. If the drying of the mixture containing charcoal in the same
proportion is prolonged until it no longer gives off any amoniacal smell
it hardens as before, otherwise it gives off either smoke or smell in
burning. Repeated experiments have confirmed the principle of reaction
above described by the substitution of carbon for the azoto and
hydrogen whilst the product loses all noxious smell and smoke at the
same time acquiring a superior cohesion and combustibility.
Fourthly. It results from the above-mentioned facts that the addition
of charcoal to excrements to convert them into fucl does not in any way
injure the fertilizing principle (azote and mineral salts) which are con-
tained in the fecal matters. The azote in fact may be easily collected at
the very moment of the manufacture of the fuel, and fixed in a convenient
combination, such, for example, as carbonate, sulphate, and chlorydrate
of ammonia, and the mineral salts are returned in the form of ashes
left by the new fuel. On the other hand the introduction of naphthaline in

page_text: compounds having excrements for their base has the effect of increasing
the heating power at the same time as the power of cohesion, particularly
when the excrements are mixed with the poorer description of coal, it
is in this manner that naphthaline offers a considerable advantage.
Naphthaline notwithstanding its remarkable heating power has never
that we are aware been able hitherto to be utilized for fuel, in fact it
emits in burning a very fetid smoke very thick and very much charged
with carbon. In the grate it fuses in the manner of a deliquescent body
and thus loses a considerable portion of its heating power. Moreover it
does not possess in itself either in a hot or cold state any colicsive power,
and it has hitherto only been able to be utilized under the form of a soot
very divided and of moderate value. Mixed with excrements we have
found naphthaline operate in the following remarkable manner :—It
increases the dissolving power of the greasy matters arising from the
fecal matters and if there be added to the mixture any kind of dust of
charcoal, wood, coke, coals, anthracite, or carbonized turf, the naphthaline
by fixing itself on the molecules of the charred matters increases the
heating power of the same and adds at the same time to the cohesive force
of the fecal matters. The product thus obtained presents extreme
solidity, it resists blows and damp, and during the operation of moulding
it is not necessary to make it undergo any considerable compression.
In a word this product constitutes a manufacturing fuel of an entirely
superior quality.
Always bearing in mind that the solidity in the fire of the above
charcoal depends on the nature of the dust mixed with the naphthaline
and with the fecal matters. When the coal dust is obtained from a
substance poor in bituminous matter it is necessary to add ordinary soot
or other bituminous body. The fuel resulting from the above mixture
is superior to natural coal and compounds for fuel artificially obtained.
It burns without any repulsive odour, and with an abundant amount of
flame, which the direct surface of the grate developes; it gives very little
ash because all the elements are eminently combustible, and finally its
cost of production is very economical in consequence of the manu-
facture being very simple and the matters of which the fuel is composed
very cheap.
The features of novelty in this Invention consist in effecting either
in the open air or in a closed vessel the elimination under the ammo-
niacal form of the azote and the hydrogen of human excrements by

page_text: means of the addition of charcoal or any other bodies rich in carbon, this
carbon spontaneously substituting itself at the end of a more or less
lengthened period for the elements constituting the ammonia which
have been eliminated from the fecal matters. The human excrements
and charcoal or other carbonaceous substance may be in any proportion, 5
and if desirable other than human excrementitious matters may be
cmployed to facilitate the formation of the paste to be moulded by the
addition of any binding substance, such as clay or sulphate of zinc.
Sulphuric and chlorydic acid in small quantities but neutralized by
reaction by any base whatever procures for the product a very great 1
cohesion and increases thus the solidity of the combustible.
Finally we reserve to ourselves the right of adding to the above
mixture for the manufacture of compounds of which excrements are the
base the substance called naphthaline in any proportion whatever.
We also reserve to ourselve the right to effect in any proportion the 1
mixture of naphthaline with fecal matters, bodies rich in carbon, ordinary
soot, or other bituminous bodies.