Application News Peepoo,
Application News Peepoo, a Toilet for the Poorest Have you ever heard of aviãozinhos? Probably not, as you probably do not live in the favelas - the slums of Rio de Janeiro. Aviãozinho is the Portuguese word for ‘small aircraft’. In other shanty towns or slums in the world expressions like ‘scud missiles’ or ‘flying bombs’ are well known and dreaded. All these words stand for plastic bags that are, for lack of a toilet, filled with ‘nature’s call’ and then flung away as far as possible. “Please don’t step on any plastic. It might contain a bomb!” warns John Murage, assistant project officer for the African Medical Research Foundation’s (Amref) Integrated Primary Health Care Programme in Nairobi’s Kibera slums. Two and a half billion people do not have access to a toilet, 70 % of them living in cities. Most of them do not have a choice other than using plastic bags or doing it on an open space. One solution to improve the situation - at least slightly - is Peepoo. The word is derived from the English kid’s expressions for urine and excreta. A Peepoo is a bag made from a biodegradable plastic based on BASF’s Ecoflex and coated with urea on the inside, which works to rapidly destroy pathogens. The two-layer design of the bags ensures that the bacteria in human excreta do not come into contact with the skin because the inner, wider, tube helps to keep the hands clean when holding or closing the bag. After use the bags can be collected for disposal on agricultural areas where they serve as fertilizer or they can be buried anywhere. Photo: Ashley Wheaton How to use the Peepoo toilet 1 2 3 4 1 2 5 6 The system is particularly beneficial for women, who can go to the toilet at their convenience in places where it is not socially acceptable for women to leave the home or to be seen accessing sanitation facilities (or defecating in the open). These women will experience reduced stress and health problems related to withholding urine and faeces (such as urinary tract infections and constipation); and they will not be exposed to the physical and sexual abuse that occurs at night when many women wait to go to the toilet under cover of darkness. The German ‘Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ)’ recently did a comprehensive study on ‘A medium-scale trial of single-use, self-sanitising toilet bags in poor urban settlements in Bangladesh. The 92 page report, in English, can be downloaded from www.bioplasticsmagazine.de/201004. Developed by the Swedish architect Anders Wilhelmson, small amounts of peepoo bags are being tested this summer. His company Peepoople will then start mass production. MT www.peepoople.com 7 8 9 Wash your hands! march 2010 © Peepoole (www.peepoople.com) 26 bioplastics MAGAZINE [04/10] Vol. 5
Application News First Biodegradable Piping Bag Shiseido Personal Care Products for China Shiseido, a major Japanese and international cosmetics company, offers its URARA branded shampoo, conditioner, body soap, and other personal care products packaged in new Ingeo natural plastic bottles now in China. The URARA branded products will be available at more than 3,500 retail locations throughout China. Chinese consumers are increasingly focused on products and manufacturing activities that are more environmentally sustainable. Shiseido thinks Chinese consumers will respond favorably to the new bottle, which is 51% Ingeo natural plastic resin in composition. Furthermore, Shiseido has not only reduced greenhouse gas emissions and effluents from its operations, but also planted trees in China as an offset to CO 2 in the atmosphere. Shiseido has been promoting environmental responsibility in all its business areas since the company established its ‘Shiseido Eco Policy‘ in 1992. In March 2009 Shiseido was the first organization in the cosmetic industry to be certified as an Eco First Company, by Japan’s Ministry of the Environment. Only those companies making significant environmental gains in all aspects of their operations qualify for Eco First certification. www.shiseido.com KEE Plastics AB from Norrköping, Sweden, one of the world’s leading producers of piping bags, introduces the world’s first truly biodegradable and compostable piping bag made from FKuR’s bioresins. KEE Plastics have developed a multi-layer biofilm bag which combines excellent mechanical properties with perfect grip. “Using a highly viscous paste is tricky! Our piping bags are famous for their seal strength and overall quality,” says Gunilla Ejeblad, Managing Director of KEE Plastics, “Thanks to FKuR´s material properties and the excellent application support; we were able to make it out of Bioplastics!” For the Piping Bag various Bio-Flex ® grades were selected. The special multilayer system provides an outstanding seal strength and modulus as well as a high degree of renewability along with excellent extrusion performance. The in-line production also puts extreme demands on the integrity and reproducibility of the materials used. In addition these Piping Bags are biodegradable (according to EN 13432) and have all of the necessary food approvals. KEE Plastics produces piping bags, which are manufactured in Sweden. The company holds patents for piping bag solutions. ‘Kee-seal Ultra‘ and ‘Kee-seal‘ are trade marks of KEE Plastics and since last October they have added the new biodegradable solution ‘Kee-Bio‘. www.keeplastics.se www.fkur.com bioplastics MAGAZINE [04/10] Vol. 5 27
