Field-testing and demonstration of sanitation technologies: Guidelines for the South African sanitation technology enterprise Programme (SASTEP)

These guidelines have been developed under a South African Water Research Commission (WRC) funded project to develop guidance on how to demonstrate and test innovative sanitation systems in real world environments prior to manufacture and commercialisation. The guidelines have been written for local technology and commercialisation partners (LTCPs) in the sanitation field and are based on the experiences of the Engineering Field Testing Platform (EFTP) established under a Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation grant in 2017 in eThekwini, South Africa. The EFTP team is a partnership between the Pollution Research Group (PRG) and the School of Built Environment and Development Studies (BEDS) at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), eThekwini Municipality’s water and sanitation unit (EWS), and Khanyisa Projects, an independent engineering consulting firm. The aim of these guidelines is to: Provide standardised sanitation field-testing and demonstration guidelines for LTCPs Provide standardised assessment and evaluation criteria for all sanitation field-testing and demonstration activities in South Africa Contextualise sanitation field-testing and demonstration requirements for LTCPs The guidelines aim to assist LTCPs, regulators and laboratories to understand the various stages required for the field-testing and demonstration of sanitation systems. Case studies and examples are incorporated to show how other innovative sanitation technologies have been tested in ‘real world’ environments, and the challenges and benefits of this approach. Milestones during the field-testing and demonstration programme are highlighted, and where applicable, templates for surveys and key documentation are included. Recommended further reading is also provided. The primary target audience of these guidelines are the LTCPs interested in testing and demonstrating sanitation systems in ‘real world’ environments. Secondary audiences are the regulators and the laboratories who have an interest in supporting this work. Regulators play a key role in the testing and demonstration of such systems, as they assist in identifying potential demonstration sites in communities, and are responsible for communicating with political and community leadership. In addition, the outcomes of the demonstration will inform them of the opportunities for implementing innovative sanitation systems to support service delivery. Testing of innovative sanitation systems involves sampling and analysis of various input and output streams, and every demonstration will require access to an analytical laboratory capable of undertaking the necessary analyses.