June 27, 2006

Coming soon to a men’s room near you

PETER KENTER

correspondent

TORONTO

The waterless urinal — a urinal with no water supply lines — is becoming increasingly popular in the U.S., and some parts of Canada. Instead of using a typical water-filled trap, the urinals use either a replaceable trap filled with an oily barrier layer or a mechanical trap, while gravity does the rest. Occasional cleaning takes care of any “build-up.”

Though the concept takes some getting used to, there are compelling reasons to install the units: water savings and Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) points awarded by the Canadian Green Building Council (CaGBC). Installing the urinals can reduce potable water usage and help to contribute toward as many as two LEED points to a construction development.

Not everyone likes them, however. Members of United Association Plumbers Local 690 recently balked at the installation of 116 waterless urinals in Philadelphia’s Comcast Center, because local building codes didn’t allow for them. Rather than granting a variance, the union compromised by installing water lines that were capped inside the walls. Property developer Liberty Property Trust agreed not to install waterless units in other Philly buildings during a five-year trial period.

The waterless urinal that caused problems in Philadelphia.

“It doesn’t surprise me at all,” says Ian Theaker, LEED program manager with CaGBC. “Things change and there are people whose interests don’t really change along with them. I would expect a plumber to install a waterless urinal, which still requires drains. There’s no reason to install redundant plumbing supply lines.”

Theaker notes that waterless urinals are more common in the U.S. and have been installed at several locations in British Columbia — including CaGBC’s first offices at the Vancouver Island Technology Park. He says that original designs have been improved on, with wider drain apertures, and trap cartridges that require less frequent replacement.

Terry Janssen is CEO of Ecotech Water, the Florida company that supplied the urinals at the heart of the Philadelphia controversy. His company has developed a permanent mechanical trap that will open after contact with just a few drops of liquid, then close again.

“Although some of the fluid-filled traps were billed as good for up to 7,000 uses, some of our customers reported that they were getting perhaps 750 to 1,200 uses, replacing cartridges every week,” he says. “Initially, we believed what we hoped to hear, but close monitoring showed that some customers were spending more on cartridges than they were saving on water.”

The National Plumbing Code of Canada doesn’t cover waterless urinals. Experience shows that existing installation requirements for water-fed urinal drains may need to be exceeded.

“The standard drain slope, a quarter-inch for every 50 feet, doesn’t work as well with the waterless units,” says Theaker. “Because of the concentration of urine, uric acid crystallizes within the pipe, similar to the way the crystals form in high usage public urinals. In retrofits, you might have to send a snake down the drain pipe every few months.”

Percy Gamboa, senior designer with Prism Engineering in Burnaby B.C., says his company has installed waterless urinals in six recent B.C. projects.

“They’re really quite new in Canada, and although plumbers are unionized, they will install them. It all takes a bit of getting used to.”

While not yet common in Ontario, Toronto’s Upper Canada College recently installed 11 waterless urinals as part of its efforts to green the facility.

“These fittings aren’t really on our radar yet,” says Mike Zangari, Ontario Representative with the United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices of the Plumbing & Pipefitting Industry of the United States and Canada. “If there was an issue around installing them, I would have certainly heard about it from one of our locals.”

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