The Greywater Treatment System in the Harmony House has seen several design evolutions throughout the years. Treatment of water from sinks, showers, dishwasher and laundry machine has been going on for about ten years.

Initial studies were conducted by Stephen Ponce-Pore, and in 1994 Mike Gable worked on a redesign of this initial system. The original system was comprised of a set of three large wooden bins, each about 13 feet long, 1 1/2 feet deep, and 1 1/2 feet wide. These beds, located in the south-facing sun space of the house were filled with different types of gravel and were planted with papyrus (Cyperus alternifolius). The water was delivered to these beds from an anaerobic settling tank and was allowed to flow beneath the surface of gravel for the length of these beds before being discharged from the house.

Mike established four objectives for this project 1. to replant the greywater beds and continue to collect water quality data from the system, 2. to reduce the original size of the beds by one-third as a test of its efficiency, 3. to make the system self-watering, and 4. to investigate reported odor problems.

By the fall of 2000 this system was in need of maintenance and was causing a bad odor in the house. At this time another MS3 student, Spencer Welton took over the redesign and construction of a new greywater treatment system. This project not only included redesign of the greywater treatment but also the entire sun space where it would be housed. Designing and constructing this new greywater treatment system was not intended to provide immediate answers to the challenges of water treatment. Instead it was designed and built as a toolkit, a "laboratory" to investigate the possibilities in greywater treament methods.

The current system was designed to meet three main goals, 1. easy maintenance, 2. flexible and adaptable to student investigation and changing needs of the future, 3. integration of the system into the existing space.

- Spencer Welton Alternator Article

Initial Greywater Recycling System with Papyrus

New Greywater System