Estate Living Magazine Design for living - Issue 42 June 2019 | Page 42

I N V E S T
&
D E V E L O P
LIQUID
GOLD
AND LOW-EMISSION BRICKS
The world’s first bio-brick made using human urine was unveiled at UCT this week. In picture are (from left) the
Department of Civil Engineering’s Dr Dyllon Randall and his students, Vukheta Mukhari and Suzanne Lambert.
The manufacture and transport of bricks
contributes quite a lot to the carbon footprint of
a building, which is why some of the finest minds
all over the world are looking at alternatives – be
it beer bottles, sandbags, straw bales, bag-
stuffed plastic bottles, or bricks made from
ash, toxic sludge, compressed solid waste, and
even cannabis. So it’s pretty exciting that local
researchers have come up with a novel, energy-
efficient way of manufacturing bricks from a
waste substance that usually takes lots of water
and other resources to process – and that we
don’t usually like to talk about.
The world’s first bio-brick grown from human urine has been unveiled
by University of Cape Town (UCT) master’s student in civil engineering
Suzanne Lambert, signalling an innovative paradigm shift in waste
recovery.
The bio-bricks are created through a natural process called microbial
carbonate precipitation. It’s not unlike the way seashells are formed, said
Lambert’s supervisor Dr Dyllon Randall, a senior lecturer in water quality
engineering.
In this case, loose sand is colonised with bacteria that produce urease.
An enzyme, the urease breaks down the urea in urine while producing
calcium carbonate through a complex chemical reaction. This cements
the sand into any shape, whether it’s a solid column, or now, for the first
time, a rectangular building brick.
For the past few months Lambert and civil engineering honours student