What Happens When You Poop in A Burj Khalifa's Toilet

there are several articles and videos on the net claiming that the burj khalifa tower in dubai is not connected to a wastewater treatment plant by a sewer system but that instead the sewage is transported away using trucks you might be surprised that the tallest building in the world which is a spectacle in every other way does not cater to this serious dilemma continue watching the video to know how the emirati icon manages the waste waters from the building and click the bell icon for more updates in the future if you haven't yet now to understand why the burj khalifa doesn't have a sewage system we need to take a look at how dubai was built all of dubai's wonders were funded by the government in an effort to draw tourists and businesses into the country so in order to attract new investments dubai follows a policy of having very lenient taxes in fact they don't have any sales or income tax instead they have slowly managed to develop other sources of income but like most governments dubai's leaders have to take loans when it comes to starting new projects and this is precisely what they did when they started work on the burj khalifa a project that cost a whopping 1.5 billion dollars now this isn't the country's only expense they also expanded the emirati fleet built hotels and spent a lot of advertising as a result dubai has accumulated a lot of debt the current amount stands at 80 billion dollars which is about 77 of their gdp now this number doesn't look as bad when you compare it with other major countries like the usa or japan but the problem with dubai is that it doesn't have a stable source of income all of its earning is dependent on investments and tourism as a result the 77 gdp to debt ratio is much more volatile than in other developed countries on top of this the country was also hit hard by the credit crisis of 2008 and had to take a loan of 20 billion dollars from the bank of abu dhabi dubai was in need of some serious financing and sheikh mohammed bin rashid al maktoum the ruler of dubai was adamant about not using income takes to generate revenue as it would further decrease dubai's popularity and would reduce the investments pouring into the country as a result the government set out on completing burj khalifa as the structure would put dubai in the limelight once again as the government was rushing to complete the project they decided to forgo a sewage system as it would bring an extra cost and it wouldn't be profitable this doesn't mean that dubai doesn't have a sewage system obviously the city has one but all the extra waste from this ginormous building could not have been sustained by the current sewage setup as a result the building was not connected to the city's sewer system but where does all that human waste go it can't just disappear right well let's take a look after a hearty lunch at the restaurant atop dubai's world's tallest building you excuse yourself from the table and proceed to the restroom you flush the toilet without even thinking about it what happens to the poop any person would think the world's tallest skyscraper which requires an incredibly advanced architecture and technology to attain its heights would have an equally outstanding sewage system unfortunately that is not the case since it is not connected to a municipal wastewater treatment system as we mentioned earlier so this means that when you defecate in the burj khalifa the excrement is trucked out of the city trucked out we are astounded at the inefficiency of such a system to transfer waste water to a treatment facility outside of town one of the world's most sophisticated skyscrapers employs an archaic system so keep in mind that if you visit and use the burj khalifa's bathroom someone will have to collect your poop and transport it out of dubai terry gross of npr interviewed kate asher author of the heights anatomy of a skyscraper in november and she discussed what happens to sewage from dubai's burj khalifa and other tall buildings in dubai there are several towering buildings many of which are not linked to a local sewage system construction appears to have outrun installation of such a crucial component of any multi-storey structure ostensibly with clearance from the municipal planning department there is some form of a system but it is incapable of handling the output from an 828 meter tower so what actually happens to the waste when it is flushed from the top floor for one thing the trash shoots downpipes at 122 miles per hour which is faster than the average speed of most mainline trains in the world the important thing to remember is that the poo reaches terminal velocity much like a skydiver so after roughly five stories you can theoretically go as high as you want it does however bounce back up at the bottom therefore the drainage must be constructed to prevent this to reduce waste bounce back from pipes running down several stories of buildings the bottom of the stack the primary vertical pipe carrying the load must be at a particular angle this permits waste to flow around a bend and then horizontally down a drain where the flow reduces a process known as a hydraulic leap however for buildings with more than 20 stories the lowest two toilets must be on their own stack else things can go horribly wrong if this second system is not in place flushing a toilet at the top of the building will result in something extremely nasty pouring quickly and forcefully out of the ground level facilities as a direct result of bounce back the initial speed and volume of liquid flowing as well as the position of pipes running from toilets into the main stack all have an impact on this anyways your number one and two then go 160 stories at rapid speed gravity broke by a clever series of bends in the pipes that slows it down these pipes by the way are soundproofed because no one wants to listen to the travelling trash all day anywhere else the waste would end up in a septic system before making its way to the municipal wastewater treatment facility in greener buildings it may even pass through a network of filters before being reused for landscaping or additional flushing toilets but this is not the case at the burj khalifa some unlucky individuals or more likely several gather the wastes in trucks experts believe that at full occupancy that might be equal to a good 13 tonnes of human feces every day but the burge isn't at full occupancy so let's lower that figure let's reduce it to eight tons a very cautious figure that's still a lot of and you have to admit but there is one more factor to account for more wastewater generated by showering cleaning your teeth and so on is also added to it so it does sum up to 13 tons of waste to manage because the burj khalifa was erected in such haste that no one considered where the excrement would go those poor individuals had to transport this stinky garbage to a wastewater treatment plant where they frequently have to wait in line for up to 24 hours to dump their smelly truckload the inefficiency of such a system is astounding and it begs the question of how architecture is more than just constructing a beautiful structure architects must also examine the building's influence on the rest of the city and how it will interact with it it's all well and good to construct the world's tallest structure but if you have to remove the garbage using inefficient and expensive vehicles you have failed well anything is possible when you are looking to cut costs so that is all the time we had today folks hope you enjoyed this video don't forget to subscribe and do hit the bell icon to remain updated about all our future videos see you all next time

Channel: Tech Space

Views: 947,244

Keywords: what happens when you poop in a burj khalifa's toilet, dubai, united arab emirates, burj khalifa, poop truck, dubai sewage system, what happens after you flush, burj khalifa poop trucks, dubai debt crisis, burj khalifa sewage, dubai poop trucks, where does sewage go, poop trucks, dubai poop, dubai sewage, dubai is a parody of the 21st century, dubai is a parody of the 21st century reaction, uae, skyscraper

Id: PR2cpnqlfrU

Length: 7min 46sec (466 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 04 2021