A new peer‑reviewed paper in Water SA looks at real blackwater from operating passenger trains, not lab-made samples. Indicating the type of waste water where Noah Water Solutions has been working on with their decentralised sanitation unit.
Noah Water Solutions was happy to contribute to this manuscript and work with Universiteit Gent campus Kortrijk and Khulna University Bangladesh.

Key takeaways:
• Vacuum toilets cut water use by >90%, but create highly concentrated waste
• Train blackwater is rich in COD, ammonium and phosphate
• Simple pH adjustment already enables strong nutrient recovery
• Electrocoagulation–flotation removed ~60% COD and ~70% phosphate at low energy use

What we value most in this paper is that it’s based on real operational conditions: rush‑hour trains, real storage times, real variability. That’s where many sanitation concepts fail and where they need to work.

If you’re interested in decentralized treatment, mobile sanitation, or nutrient recovery from concentrated streams, this one is worth a read.

Thank you to our Noah Team members Bahram Barati, Dries Parmentier and Roemer Goossensen and our partners Nazia Hassan, Pengyu Dong and Stijn Van Hulle for contributing to this research.