Juliette

Peter Trimble

Furniture made out of sand, urine and bacteria.

Did you ever wonder about the power of your pee? Peter Trimble did. For his thesis project he investigated the possibilities of bacteria and the urea found in urine. What he found was a way to reinvent the conventional concrete with a portable device called Dupe. A new material was invented: biostone.

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Stools made of sand and urine by Peter Trimble - Edinburgh College of Art student Peter Trimble has built a portable machine for manufacturing furniture from sand, urine and bacteria. Edinburgh College of Art student Peter Trimble has built a portable machine for manufacturing furniture from sand, urine and bacteria. As part of his thesis project, Peter Trimble explored how bacteria and the urea found in urine might be used to create a reusable material that requires fewer resources than conventional concrete. Peter Trimble

Trimble used this material to make bio-furniture by use of his homemade machine made from parts of an old coffee machine, an old blender mixer, a mould and a tank to hold the fluid.
But how does this work? The device injects a liquid solution, made up of bacillus pasteurii bacteria and nutrient rich fluid, into the sand filled mould. The liquid and sand mixture is then left overnight to combine evenly. Calcium chloride, urea and more nutrient fluid is then added to the combination the following day. Calcite is formed when the urea fertilizes the bacteria which then creates a sticky like substance that mends to the sand.

After two days of unification, the process is complete. A small stool has been made capable of upholding approximately 90 kilograms of weight. Trimble also believes this machine could be adjusted to make building bricks or other materials and could save energy used in concrete manufacturing during the process. "Concrete is responsible for five per cent of global carbon dioxide," he explained, "Dupe is a low cost production method using very little energy and sand, a cheap and abundant raw material."
While Trimble's invention may need some altering to produce material as strong as concrete, he is well on his way to improving our future building techniques.