Application Level
The application level is meant to provide additional information when comparing different locally appropriate sanitation system options in order to select the preferred one in the given case. Three spatial levels are defined under this heading:
- Household: implies that the technology is appropriate for one or several households.
- Neighbourhood: means that the technology is appropriate for anywhere between several and several hundred households.
- City: implies that the technology is appropriate at the city-wide level (either one unit for the whole city, or many units for different parts of the city).
An indication of whether a technology is applicable at a specific application level is given using asterisks (two asterisks: applicable, one asterisk: less sapplicable, no asterisk: not applicable).
This criterion does not apply to the technologies belonging to the user interface functional group since their application level depends largely on the subsequent technologies.
Question for the technology
How suitable is the technology to a certain application level?
Capital Expenditure (Capex) Requirements
The capital expenditure requirement level presents an indication of the expected level of costs that will arise from the implementation of a given technology. It is based on the estimation of required resources using expert judgement. Three types of required resources are considered, namely, material, labour, and land. The criterion investment requirements can indicate the investment cost levels when considered together with local market prices for different resources.
The judgement is made by comparing technologies per functional group. For technologies from the functional group U and S, the judgement is made based on one typical unit and not per user. For technologies belonging to functional groups C, T, and D, the judgement is made for applications of comparable scale and per user.
For each technology, the quantities of material, labour, and land are individually judged and allotted a value 1, 2, or 3 indicating low, medium, high, respectively. The final score for any technology is then determined based on the sum of points from the above three parameters assuming that they all have the same weight.
- Low cost (3 points): means that only small amounts of material, labour and land are required.
- Medium cost (4 to 6 points): implies that medium amounts of material and/or labour and/or land are required.
- High cost (7 to 9 points): implies that large amounts of material and/or labour and/or land are required.
The investment and operation requirement level is not meant to provide sufficient information to select a certain technology. It merely provides additional information for comparing different sanitation system configuration options. It must be looked at together with other criteria such as resource recovery, emissions, or appropriateness. A key consideration is also that the final costs not only depend on local market prices but also on economies of scale and who of the stakeholders will pay for the costs depending on different technologies. Thus, for a detailed evaluation and selection of the most preferred option, investment and operation requirement levels are not enough but a context-specific cost estimation will be required based on local unit prices, financial arrangements, and economies of scale.
Question for the technology
What is the capital expenditure (Capex) requirement level of the technology?
Cleansing Method
Cleansing method is defined by two categories:
- Washers: refers to the use of anal cleansing water
- Soft wipers: refers to the use of toilet paper or other soft materials.
- Hard wipers: refers to the use of any other, mostly hard and bulky material such as maize cobs.
Cleansing method is defined for the user interface (FG U) technologies only.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain anal cleansing material?
Question for the case
How is the cleansing method distributed in your case area?
Concrete Supply
The concrete supply refers to concrete required to build the technology. The concrete supply is defined by three categories:
- No concrete.
- Difficultly available: concrete is difficult to source locally (high prices or fluctuating availability).
- Concrete: concrete is easily available.
Concrete supply is defined for all technologies regardless from their functional group and is important for technologies that need to be lined or sealed (e.g. biogas settler, sedimentation ponds)
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain concrete availability?
Question for the case
What is the local availability of concrete in your case area?
Construction Parts Supply
Construction parts supply is applied specifically for humanitarian contexts, where accessibility of construction materials might be limited or special prefabricated parts might cause delays and higher costs due to the required transportation. It is defined by three categories:
- Simple: conventional metal, wood parts.
- Technical: technical parts generally available (e.g. a siphon).
- Special: parts that need to be specifically manufactured (e.g. a membrane).
Question for the technology
What are the proportion (%) of different kinds of parts that are required to build this technology?
Question for the case
What level of accessibility does each type of parts (required for construction) have in your case?
Construction Skills
Construction skills refer to the skills required for the construction of sanitation technologies and is defined by three categories:
- Unskilled labour: casual/daily labourer such as mason, artisan, or craftsman.
- Skilled labour: plumber, technician (maintenance, lab, IT), mechanic, electrician, trained mason/artisan/craftsman.
- Professional: highly qualified engineer, architect, planner, or supervisor.
Construction skills is defined for all technologies regardless from their functional group. It is not representative of the entire local workforce but only the one that will be involved in the implementation of sanitation technologies.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain availability of construction skills?
Question for the case
How is the construction skills availability distributed in your case area?
Design Skills
Design skills refer to the skills required for the technical design of technologies and is defined by three categories:
- Unskilled labour: casual/daily labourer such as mason, artisan, or craftsman.
- Skilled labour: plumber, technician (maintenance, lab, IT), mechanic, electrician, trained mason/artisan/craftsman.
- Professional: highly qualified engineer, architect, planner, or supervisor.
The criteria is defined for all technologies regardless from their functional group. It is not representative of the entire local workforce but only the one that will be involved in the implementation of sanitation technologies.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain availability of design skills?
Question for the case
How is the design skills availability distributed in your case area?
Development Phase
Qualitative estimates of the applicability of each technology given the phase of humanitarian context in a specific case. It is based on three categories:
- Acute: refers to the humanitarian phase immediately following an emergency. It usually covers the first days up to the first few weeks, where effective short-term measures are applied to alleviate the emergency situation quickly until more permanent solutions can be found.
- Stabilisation (or Transition): refers to the phase starting after the first weeks of a crisis and can last several months or longer.
- Development/Recovery: refers to either a longer-term approach aiming to develop sanitation infrastructure in general (Development) or in a humanitarian context (Recovery), it refers to the phase where the aim is to rehabilitate infrastructure or implement long-lasting sanitation infrastructure and services.
Stars are used to indicate how appropriate a technology is for different development phases: ** two stars means applicable, * one star means less applicable, and no star means not applicable. The allocation of technologies to different humanitarian/development phases is mainly based on speed of implementation, budget and material requirements. It allows giving a first general orientation but may differ in a specific local situation.
Question for the technology
What is the applicablity of a technology for a certain humanitarian/development phase ?
Drinking Water Exposure
The drinking water exposure is s important for technologies that rely on soil absorption and might pose a risk to nearby drinking water sources. It is defined by two categories:
- Close: refers to a distance less than 30 meters from the implementation site to the closest drinking water source (e.g. a groundwater well).
- Not close: refers to a distance of more than 30 meters from the implementation site to the closest drinking water source.
Drinking water exposure is defined for the collection and storage (FG S), and reuse and disposal (FG D) technologies.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology with respect to preventing the risk of pollution given a drinking water source is closer than 30 meters?
Question for the case
How many of the implementation sites can pollute nearby drinking water sources (e.g. groundwater wells)?
Electricity Supply
The type of electricity supply defined by three categories:
- Continuous electricity: power cuts are highly unlikely.
- Intermittent electricity: frequent power cuts are occurring.
- No electricity.
The technology appropriateness is quantified based on the performance of a technology during normal operation and maintenance (e.g. for pumping, ventilation, aeration) given a certain energy supply.
Electricity supply is defined for the collection and storage (FG S), treatment (FG T), and reuse or disposal (FG D) technologies. Technologies for conveyance (FG C) such as sewers might need electricity depending on the slope and the pumps required, however, this is covered separately by other criteria ("Slope"" and "Pump Supply").
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain electricity supply type?
Question for the case
What proportion of each type of electricity supply is available in the given case?
Excavation
The ease of excavation is important for technologies that have to be constructed below ground. It is defined by two categories:
- Easy: can be excavated without special machinery.
- Hard: needs special machinery and equipment for instance in rocky ground conditions.
Excavation is defined for the collection and storage (FG S), conveyance (FG C), treatment (FG T), and reuse and disposal (FG D) technologies.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain level of difficulty in excavation?
Question for the case
How is the ease of excavation distributed in your case area?
Flooding
The flooding by two categories:
- No flooding: describes conditions where surface flooding is a rare phenomenon.
- Flooding: describes conditions where intense rainfall and/or rise in levels of a neighbouring water body leads to flooding of surfaces.
Flooding is defined for the onsite collection and storage/treatment (FG S), conveyance (FG C), treatment (FG T), and reuse or disposal (FG D) technologies.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain flooding risk?
Question for the case
How is the flooding risk distributed in your case area?
Frequency of Operation and Maintenance (O&M)
The frequency of operation and maintenance (O&M) is defined based on the extent of labour (type of task and time) required to maintain a certain technology. Maintenance considered is cleaning, repairing and/or replacing mechanical parts but NOT emptying/desludging. It is evaluated in three categories:
- Low / Irregular: such as occasional cleaning or eventual repair. No maintenance of odour seals, washing with detergents or monitoring is required.
- Medium / Regular: more time-consuming operations such as regular cleaning, washing with detergents (e.g. the bowl with acid) or checking and replacing odour seals.
- High / Continuous: requiring permanent staff (full-time job) for maintenance, repair, removing scum, etc.
Frequency of O&M is defined for all technologies regardless from their functional group.
Question for the technology
How are the operation and maintenance (O&M) requirements of the technology distributed among the three categories?
Question for the case
What level of operation and maintenance capacity is available/feasible in your case area?
Fuel Supply
The fuel supply is defined by two categories:
- Fuel: refers to if fuel is always available.
- No fuel.
The technology appropriateness is quantified based on the performance of a technology during normal operation (motorized transport in vehicles or with pumps) given a certain fuel supply.
Fuel supply is defined for conveyance (FG C) technologies alone.
To avoid technologies from being discarded (as the possibility of electric vehicles exists or during lack of fuel motorized vehicles can be replaced temporarily by manual labour), one should refrain from entering the value 100% for 'no fuel'.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain fuel supply?
Question for the case
What proportion of of the areas as what level of fuel supply?
Groundwater Depth
The groundwater depth is defined as the lowest and highest level in meters distance from the surface over a year’s time. It screens out technologies that are not sealed and underground. A distance of three meters between the point of infiltration (e.g. the bottom of a pit) and the groundwater table is assumed to be safe.
Groundwater depth is defined for the onsite collection and storage/treatment (FG S), and reuse and disposal (FG D) technologies. Conveyance (FG C) and treatment (FG T) technologies are assumed to be sealed against the ground.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain groundwater depth?
Question for the case
What is the local groundwater depth?
Lifetime
Lifetime is defined for humanitarian contexts based on three categories:
- Short: < 1 year
- Medium: 1-5 years
- Long: > 5 years
Lifetime is defined for storage and treatment (FG S), (Semi-)centralized treatment (FG T) and reuse or disposal (FG D) technologies.
If a technology has a long service life, it can be also used for shorter periods of time but it may require a longer start-up time. The minimum lifetime of a technology (e.g. start-up or storage times) is not taken into consideration but is defined by the speed of implementation.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of technology given a certain expected design lifetime?
Question for the case
What lifetime is a technology required to have in the case?
Management Level
Management Level describes the organizational style best used for the operation and maintenance (O&M) of the given technology:
- Household implies that the household, i.e. the family, is responsible for all O&M.
- Shared means that a group of users (e.g. at a school, a community-based organization, or market vendors) handles the O&M by ensuring that a person or a committee is responsible for it on behalf of all users. Shared facilities are defined by the fact that the community of users decides who is allowed to use the facility and what their responsibilities are; it is a self-defined group of users.
- Public implies institutional or government run facilities, and all O&M is assumed by the agency operating the facility. Usually, only users who can pay for the service are permitted to use public facilities.
- An indication regarding the appropriateness of each management level is given using zero to two asterisks, with two asterisks meaning that the technology can be well handled at the respective level.
The technologies in the functional group user Interface do not include a management level since maintenance is dependent on the subsequent technologies, and not simply on the user interface.
Question for the technology
How suitable is the technology to a certain management level?
Operation and Maintenance Skills
Operation and maintenance (O&M) skills refer to the skills required for regular maintenance of sanitation technologies and is defined by three categories:
- Unskilled: casual/daily labourer such as pit digger, sanitary worker, pit emptier.
- Skilled: plumber, technician (maintenance, lab, IT), mechanic, electrician, trained mason/artisan/craftsman. Also includes basic administrative and finance skills
- Professional: highly qualified collection supervisor, treatment supervisor, chemist, and administrator (including finance).
O&M skills is defined for all technologies regardless from their functional group. It is not representative of the entire local workforce but only the one that will be involved in the operation and maintenance of sanitation technologies.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain availability of operation and maintenance (O&M) skills?
Question for the case
How is the operation and maintenance skills availability distributed in your case area?
Operation Expenditure (Opex) Requirements
The operation expenditure requirement level presents an indication of the expected level of costs that will arise from the implementation of a given technology. It is based on the estimation of required resources using expert judgement. Three types of required resources are considered, namely, material, labour, and electricity/fuel. The criterion operation requirements can indicate the operation cost levels when considered together with local market prices for different resources.
The judgement is made by comparing technologies per functional group over a lifetime of 10 years. For technologies from the functional group U and S, the judgement is made based on one typical unit and not per user. For technologies belonging to functional groups C, T, and D, the judgement is made for applications of comparable scale and per user.
For each technology, the quantities of material, labour, and electricity/fuel are individually judged and allotted a value 1, 2, or 3 indicating low, medium, high, respectively. The final score for any technology is then determined based on the sum of points from the above three parameters assuming that they all have the same weight.
- Low cost (3 points): means that only small amounts of material, labour and electricity/fuel are required.
- Medium cost (4 to 6 points): implies that medium amounts of material and/or labour and/or electricity/fuel are required.
- High cost (7 to 9 points): implies that large amounts of material and/or labour and/or electricity/fuel are require
The investment and operation requirement level is not meant to provide sufficient information to select a certain technology. It merely provides additional information for comparing different sanitation system configuration options. It must be looked at together with other criteria such as resource recovery, emissions, or appropriateness. A key consideration is also that the final costs not only depend on local market prices but also on economies of scale and who of the stakeholders will pay for the costs depending on different technologies. Thus, for a detailed evaluation and selection of the most preferred option, investment and operation requirement levels are not enough but a context-specific cost estimation will be required based on local unit prices, financial arrangements, and economies of scale.
Question for the technology
What is the operation expenditure (Opex) requirement level of the technology?
Pipe Supply
The pipe supply is defined by three categories:
- No pipes.
- Difficultly available: pipes are difficult to source locally (high prices or fluctuating availability).
- Pipes: pipes are easily available.
Pipe supply is defined for the collection and storage (FG S), conveyance (FG C), treatment (FG T), and reuse and disposal (FG D) technologies and includes all pipes (e.g. drainage, ventilation, inlet, outlet).
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain pipe availability?
Question for the case
How is the pipe supply distributed in your case area?
Pump Supply
The pump supply refers to pumps for emptying, discharge, mixing, overcoming elevations, or generating pressure in sanitation technologies. It is defined by three categories:
- No pumps.
- Difficultly available: pumps are difficult to source locally (high prices or fluctuating availability)
- Pumps: pumps are easily available.
Pump supply is defined for the collection and storage (FG S), conveyance (FG C), treatment (FG T), and reuse and disposal (FG D) technologies.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain pump availability?
Question for the case
How is the pump supply distributed in your case area?
Scalability
Scalability refers to the possibility to extend for increased users to be served. It is defined by two categories:
- Easy: refers to if the technology can be easily up-scaled to accommodate changing number of users.
- Difficult: refers to difficulty in achieving the above.
Scalability is either possible due to a flexible design that allows for larger inputs or a modular design where units can be added to extend capacity. The focus is on the technological feasibility to scale up and limitations such as space or economics are not considered.
The criterion is implemented for storage and treatment (FG S), conveyance (FG C) and (Semi-) centralized treatment (FG T) technologies.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology if its capacity needs to be scaled up?
Question for the case
What scalability is a technology required to provide in your case?
Slope
Slope can be an important aspect for all technologies but here it is considered relevant for conveyance technologies (FG C): sewers and road-based transport. Slope is defined by three categories:
- Flat: 0-1% gradient.
- Not flat: this includes everything from rolling to steep slopes (>1% gradient).
Note: 1% gradient is not equal to 1°. To convert degrees [°] to percent gradient [%], use this formula:
α[%] = tangent(α[°]) x 100
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain ground slope?
Question for the case
How is the slope distributed in your case area?
Soil Type
Soil type determines the soil absorption capacity and thus the percolation rate and filtration capacity. Soil type is defined by five categories:
- Rock (continous stratum): extremely low/negligible permeability with risk of stagnation and limited cleansing capacity.
- Clay: very low permeability, with risk of stagnation and limited cleansing capacity.
- Silt: low permeability with moderate risk of stagnation but adequate filtration or cleansing capacity.
- Sand: moderate permeability with good percolation and good soil filtration or cleansing capacity.
- Gravel: high permeability, is considered best for percolation, but the cleansing capacity is very limited.
Soil type is used for collection and storage (FG S), and reuse and disposal (FG D) technologies.
The importance of the soil type for construction stability is not considered here.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain soil type/permeability?
Question for the case
How is the soil type distributed in your case area?
Spare Parts Supply
Spare parts refers to the parts to be replaced during maintenance and repair, including covers, siphons, membranes, etc. The spare parts supply is defined by three categories:
- Simple: conventional parts generally locally available (e.g. simple metal or wood parts, covers, slabs).
- Technical: technical parts generally available (e.g. a siphon).
- Special: parts that need to be specifically manufactured (e.g. a membrane).
Spare parts supply is defined for all technologies regardless from their functional group.
Question for the technology
How are the spare parts requirements of the technology distributed among the three categories?
Question for the case
What level of spare parts supply is available/feasible in your case area?
Speed of Implementation for Toilet Structure
The criterion has been developed specifically and is only applicable for humanitarian contexts. Semi-quantitative estimates of the performance of each technology given the preference for the time within which functional toilets are required in a specific case. It is based on the following three categories:
- Rapid: refers to when implementation is possible under three days.
- Moderate: refers to an implementation time between three days to two weeks.
- Slow: refers to an implementation time longer than two weeks.
Toilet coverage with safe onsite containment is a priority and often comes prior to the implementation of the entire treatment chain. It is relevant to use this criteria in an acute response phase.
Speed of implementation is defined for technologies for onsite collection and storage/treatment technologies (FG S).
Question for the technology
How quickly can this technology (from FG S) be implemented?
Question for the case
How acceptable are the following speeds of implementation for finishing the toilet structure?
Speed of Implementation for Treatment
Speed of implementation for treatment technologies is defined for humanitarian contexts based on three categories:
- Rapid: refers to implementation within a few days to up to one week.
- Moderate: refers to an implementation time between a few weeks up to three months.
- Slow: refers to an implementation time longer than three months. The quality of implementation of the technology is assumed to be the same for all of the aforementioned speeds, i.e. for example, ’rapid’ in no way equates to fast sub-standard construction.
A treatment system is considered to be functional after its expected construction time and start-up time if any is required (e.g. for biological processes). In the implementation phase, functional treatment system comes often after having reached toilet coverage and safe onsite containment. Therefore, it is relevant to consider this criteria more in the stabilization phase of humanitarian context.
This criterion is applicable to (semi-) centralized treatment technologies (FG T) only.
Question for the technology
How quickly can this technology (from FG T) be implemented?
Question for the case
How acceptable are the following speeds of implementation for realizing a treatment technology in your case?
Surface Area (Offsite)
The surface area (offsite) refers to the space available for technology construction offsite at a centralized location and is evaluated in m2 per person.
Note that each technology is compared to the available surface area individually. Often, several offsite technologies need to be combined, for instance a sedimentation pond with a waste stabilisation pond. The appropriateness does not account for the cumulative surface area requirements of multiple technologies.
Question for the technology
What is the degree of feasibility of the technology given a certain surface area available offsite (decentralised and centralised) in the case in m2 per person?
Question for the case
How much total surface area per person (m2/pers) is available offsite for decentralized and centralized treatment technologies for the case?
Surface Area (Onsite)
The surface area (onsite) refers to the space available for onsite technology construction. Is is evaluated in square meter per unit [m2/unit].
This criterion is defined for the collection and storage (FG S) technologies only.
Question for the technology
What is the degree of feasibility of the technology given a certain surface area available onsite in the case in m2 per unit?
Question for the case
How much surface area (m2) is available in the case per unit of planned onsite technology (e.g. for a double pit latrine)?
System Complexity
The complexity of a sanitation system is defined here by the total number of connections between technologies within a system. A system has as least X-1 connections if X is the number of technologies. For instance, a system with three technologies has at least two connections but can also have more. Thus, systems with many technologies and many connections are judged as more complex.
Technical Maturity
The technical maturity presents an indication of how well-established the technology is. It indicates how certain the information on its performance is and how much practical experience exists related to it. It is based on three different levels derived based on the technology readiness level (TRL):
- Low: implies that the technology has been applied in pilot projects, i.e. TRL 5. Technologies with a TRL lower than the pilot scale are not considered here.
- Medium: implies that the technology is emerging and has been demonstrated in one or more different contexts, i.e. TRL 6 to 8.
- High: implies that the technology is established and operational in one or more contexts, i.e. TRL 9.
The technical maturity level is meant to provide additional information when comparing different locally appropriate sanitation system options to select the preferred one in the given case.
Question for the technology
What is the technical maturity of the technology?
Temperature
Temperature is defined to account for the sensitivity of biological processes and soil infiltration to it. The temperature is quantified based on three categories (referring to daily mean temperatures):
- Very cold: refers to temperatures less than -10°C.
- Cold: refers to temperatures between -10 to 10°C.
- Temperate: refers to temperatures between 10 to 20°C.
- Warm: refers to temperatures between 20 to 30°C.
- Hot: refers to temperatures above 30°C.
Temperature is defined for the collection and storage (FG S), treatment (FG T), and reuse or disposal (FG D) technologies
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain temperature range?
Question for the case
How is the temperature distributed over the year in your case area?
Vehicular Access
Vehicular access is sometimes needed to empty onsite facilities. Vehicular access is defined by three categories:
- No access: vehicles cannot reach the site, because the road widths are less than 2 meters or the terrain is impossible to traverse.
- Difficult access: road widths are between 2-5 meters or terrain is difficult (no proper roads, hilly, etc.)
- Full access: road widths are over 5 meters and roads which larger vehicles, such as a pumping truck, can use without any problem.
Vehicular access is only used for onsite and decentralized collection and storage (FG S) technologies.
Vehicular access is sometimes seasonally limited only (e.g. flooding during monsoon), however, this is not considered here but in a separate criteria for flooding.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain type of vehicular access?
Question for the case
How is the accessibility by motorized vehicles (e.g. pumping trucks) at locations planned for onsite sanitation technologies distributed in your case area?
Water Supply
Type of water supply is defined by three categories:
- House: refers to an in-house water connection.
- Yard: refers to yard taps.
- Public: refers to public or community-managed standpipes.
- None: refers to no water supply.
The technology appropriateness is quantified based on the performance given a certain type of water supply.
Type of water supply is only applied for technologies from the user interface (FG U) since this will consequently affect water availability further down the sanitation system. For example, cistern flush toilets require an in-house water supply while pour flush toilets can work with yard supply. Water supply does not account for the amount of water available. There is another criterion "Water Volume".
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain water supply type?
Question for the case
What proportion of each type of water supply is available in the given case?
Water Volume
The water volume is defined in litres per person per day used for flushing and anal cleansing using following default values and 6 uses per day per person:
- Anal cleaning water: 0.3 to 3 litres per use
- Pour flush toilet and UDFT: 1 to 3 litres per use
- Cistern flush toilet: 6 to 10 litres per use
The technology appropriateness accounts for the minimum water volumes required (e.g. for sewer, septic tank) and the maximum that a technology can handle (e.g. for pits).
Water volume is defined for the collection and storage (FG S) and conveyance technologies (FG C). Technologies of FG S and FG C that do not handle flushwater or blackwater will always be appropriate whatever the water volume considered.
Question for the technology
What is the performance of the technology given a certain water volume entering in litres per person and day (l/person/day)?
Question for the case
How much water volume is used for sanitary use (flushing and anal cleansing) in litres per person per day?
