The internationally famous architect Bill McDonough says, “design is the first signal of human intention.”  When you design a product, you signal your intentions for its use.  If that’s so, how does the Packit Toilet design signal its intention?  McDonough continues, “if what we make with our hands is to be sacred and honor the earth that gives us life, then the things we make must not only rise from the ground but return to it, soil to soil, water to water, so everything that is received from the earth can be freely given back without causing harm to any living system...This is good design” (our italics; thanks Daria).

As for the Packit Toilet kit, the biodegradable greenbags and the biodegradable toilet paper both return to the earth without causing harm.  The seat of the toilet - now made of polypropylene plastic - can be recycled into other plastic products.  But we’re far from satisfied that the seat itself is not biodegradable.  At this point in time, we cannot find another material - other than vegetable composites which are far too expensive - that can help us achieve that.  But as soon as we can discover a biodegradable material to mold the seat that is biodegradable - or more easily recycled - and cost effective - we’ll begin manufacturing the seat from that material.  

The same goes for the material from which we make the base.   Any material strong enough to support 250 pound people made from today’s vegetable-based materials - is simply too expensive.  But we know that the costs of these materials - as well as their overall weight - will eventually come down.  Our goal is to offer a fully biodegradable toilet kit within 5-years (or less).

We know that its possible to make shampoo bottles out of beets that are biodegradable in a compost pile.  That they're now making carpeting from materials that break down into carbon dioxide and water.  That they're making furniture from lignin, potato peels, and technical enzymes, that look just like any other piece of manufactured furniture - except the furniture made from these new materials can be safely returned to the earth.   So we’re not trying to deceive you by saying that we’re staying abreast of a number of materials that might in the near future be used to make our toilet kit - all four parts - COMPLETELY BIODEGRADABLE.

We’ve Created Stress in People Through Bad Design

As McDonough points out, “We made glass buildings that are more about buildings than they are about people...The hope that glass would connect us to the outdoors was completely stultified by making the buildings sealed.  We have created stress in people because we are meant to be connected with the outdoors, but instead we are trapped.”

The focus of good design should be on people’s needs.  McDonough shows that there are certain laws - “certain fundamental laws that are inherent to the natural world that we can use as models and mentors for human design.”  The word “ecology” itself means the combining of “household” and “logical discourse.”  To have a logical discussion about the "household" - meaning the earth.  So when we say that human poop cannot be left on the ground of wildernesses - that it must be buried or packed out to be either buried outside wilderness or put into a garbage cycle - we’re trying to enter into a logical discourse about the household - we all share.  The logic is that human poop is toxic - to humans and animals and plant life, and that when left on the ground of wilderness destroys the pristine and clean-smelling environment we're ALL seeking.

What Is Natural Design?

In nature, so-called “waste” equals food for other living things.  Many of them so small they’re hard to see even under a microscope.  Yet they sustain the life of the planet.  And they eat the so-called “waste” of living systems.  But in a human body, nothing eats all of its waste.  And much of its waste is highly toxic.  In a hospital when part of a colon is removed during surgery, it’s handled as if it’s toxic waste - similar to AIDS or nuclear active material.  One doctor told us “there’s enough toxicity in one of those bags to poison everyone in the hospital and clear down the street.”

Yet when we bury our body waste in wilderness - the micro life down in the soil and rock will get rid of it and somehow not be destroyed in the process. Such is the power of biodiversity to clean up so-called "waste" - even human waste (albeit not all human waste.  Nuclear waste is still as big a problem as man confronts to survive on the planet; thousands of years are needed to re-absorb nuclear waste).

Even though the Packit Toilet kit is not fully biodegradable at this point in its history, we believe the intention of its design is clear: to help overcome a man-made problem in the shared household.  We hope this post makes it clear that our intention is not to quit until we have achieved a fully natural design: a totally biodegradable toilet kit.  In the meantime, the Packit Toilet kit is doing a lot of good in the wild places - and for the wild things that inhabit them.