The world is experiencing an increasing trend in urban disasters and protracted crises, where the limitations of existing emergency sanitation technologies are tragically displayed. Together with its partners the Red Cross Red Crescent (RCRC) movement has embarked on an evidence-led journey to develop its capacities to respond to faecal sludge management (FSM) needs in emergencies.

Humanitarian crises are complex, and support personnel in the field often has to take a multitude of decisions. While the focus is on well-being of the people, many alleged side‑aspects need to be managed, too. One such aspect is sanitation services for local residents and for emergency workers. If not properly managed, non-adequate sanitation can cause severe secondary health problems, such as outbreaks of massive diarrhea, cholera, etc.

In many contexts, sanitation will be implemented in a 2-stage approach. First, there will be an emergency sanitation system. This usually is governed by easy and fast transport of the necessary components for setting up sanitation facilities to the site, availability of sites with frequently just small footprint, a need for easy and fast start-up, as well as a treatment focus primarily on hygienic aspects. Later, in the aftermath of the initial humanitarian crises, there may be a need to provide continued sanitation, possibly for many years to come. Rarely, the initial sanitation system can simply continue in use. Be it that this facility is too costly to run for prolonged periods, that materials employed are not suited for long-term use, that it needs to be shifted to a different location with more or less land availability, that capacity requirements increase or decrease, that local authorities start raising additional requirements which this facility was not designed for in the first place, or else. Typically, in many such scenarios a new, more permanent sanitation system will become more appropriate than the emergency one.

So, the question comes up, how can local emergency response specialists take such decisions, without being in-depth sanitation specialists? Therefore, BioTreaT GmbH and Dr. Konrad Buchauer (CIST), in close cooperation with the Austrian Red Cross, develop a Technology Decision Handbook which is meant to provide an answer. It represents an easy-to-use decision guide to select the most suitable faecal sludge treatment technologies for medium- or long-term use, after the most critical initial emergency phase has passed.