Egyptian-Swiss Research on Innovations in Sustainable Sanitation: ESRISS

ESRISS is a SECO-funded research project at Sandec. It deals with the sanitation planning gap of Nile Delta villages where the main challenges are organisational and institutional, more than technical. The five-year research project, in partnership with the Egyptian Holding Company for Water and Wastewater (HCWW), tries to bring together local competencies and experiences to develop, implement and monitor an innovative decentralised sanitation system. As a parallel research component of the Integrated Sanitation & Sewerage Infrastructure Project (ISSIP), launched by the Government of Egypt in cooperation with the World Bank, it complements the establishment of centralised treatment plants in three Governorates of the Nile Delta region.

The following research questions are addressed:

(a) Knowledge development on decentralized, low-cost sanitation systems in Egyptian context:

• What are the challenges and success factors of past decentralized sanitation approaches in the Egyptian context, and why?
  
  
• What technologies (and combinations of technologies) seem most appropriate for the Nile Delta region given the land use, water or wastewater usage and local environmental factors and how do these link to aspects of nutrient recycling and resource recovery?
  
  
• What models of scaling up and application in urban environments, ensuring sustainable operation and maintenance, could be envisaged?

(b) Piloting of innovative sanitation concepts and technologies in selected sites

• How can stakeholder participation be organized and fostered to achieve sustainability of infrastructure facilities and services?
  
  
• How do the pilot systems perform in terms of technical, social, and institutional factors and what lessons can be applied for up-scaling?
  
  
• How economically viable is a decentralized treatment system compared to a traditional centralized system in terms of capital, operation and maintenance costs?

This five-year project (Mai 2010 - April 2015) is divided into three phases: during Phase I, we will assess the current status and develop implementation concepts (1 year); during Phase II, we will field-test and validate selected decentralized sanitation systems and their acceptance by local populations (2 years); during Phase III, we will capitalize on our experience and fill remaining knowledge gaps. The project is coordinated by Eng. Philippe Reymond, based in Cairo.

SECO - Swiss Programme Office in Cairo		Egyptian Holding Company for Water and Wastewater