Rich Earth Institute turns neighbours' urine into farm fertiliser via haulers' permits

As the BBC reported in 2025, the Rich Earth Institute (REI), a Vermont non-profit, runs the Urine Nutrient Reclamation Program: about 250 people in Windham County donate roughly 12,000 gallons (45,400 litres) of urine a year. A lorry collects it and it is pasteurised by heating to 80C for 90 seconds, then stored until it can be sprayed on local farmland. Participants began by dropping off laundry-detergent bottles at a central tank; some now have urine-diverting toilets with a basement tank that a lorry pumps out a couple of times a year.

The BBC says REI's executive director described the biggest hurdle as regulation: there was no form for urine, only categories such as biosolids or wastewater. REI learned the regulations' detailed language, partnered with organisations that already held permits, such as septic haulers, and tackled the permits piecemeal. It now holds the permits it needs, including one for innovative on-site wastewater management and a waste-hauling permit, and a Vermont environmental official said the state found a workable pathway.

Application is timed to when plants take up nutrients best, between seedling and fruiting, and soil moisture is measured so the liquid soaks in. REI says farmer demand exceeds supply.

Urine carries the same nitrogen and phosphorus as synthetic fertiliser, which depends on fossil-fuel-intensive production and phosphate mining, according to the BBC.

Pasteurisation and timed application address safety and runoff worries without changing what farmers do.

Partnering with permit-holders let REI operate before any rule had been written specifically for urine.

Household urine separation and tank pump-outs make donating effortless, which one donor called a big factor in participation.

When no regulatory category fits a new product, route each step through partners who already hold the relevant permits.

Since 2012 REI estimates it has conserved over 2.7 million gallons of water by avoiding toilet flushes. Scientists working with it found urine can more than double yields of crops such as kale and spinach compared with no fertiliser, per the BBC. Limits remain: urine is heavy to haul (Vermont's runs about 10 miles at most), so REI's spinoff developed a freeze-concentration system that concentrates it six times, in use at the University of Michigan; plumbing codes still complicate separating toilets in buildings. REI is working with partners in Massachusetts and Michigan on regulation.