These technologies are very important to publicize and otherwise make available in arid places, especially with the increase of drought and spread of outright desertification associated with climate change. 

Human urine is definitely good for plants.  Even food plants.  Dilute 10-15 parts water to 1 part urine, more diluted for potted plants,and use it before 24 hours go by so it hasn't turned to amonia.

Highly fertilized lawns are more vulnerable to nitrogen overload than unfertilized lawns.

The best place to pee outside would be your compost pile, especially if it is low in nitrogen. The composting process will even out the nitrogen content as well as destroy the odd hantavirus, and you can regulate how much you put on various parts of your garden.

Or dilute, as the above poster suggests--but then, you're probably not actually peeing outside, are you?

Putting waste matter into drinking water and flushing it away is insane. The recovery period is likely to be rocky. Meantime, avoid grossing everybody out: do as your hosts do.

Check out the GardenWeb Soil Forum for an entertaining thread entitled "To Pee or Not to Pee"

>>> http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/soil/msg042142151191.html

There is a higher law than current custom, and that is: "Understand the consequences of your actions and take responsibility for them."

The modern flush toilet is profoundly wasteful and un-ecological.  I predict that it will shortly be seen as criminal. Think of it -- in a world becoming desperately short of water, to waste gallons of drinking-quality water because of our tender sensibilities. During an earlier drought, Californians got used to not flushing.

If you are concerned about energy - and we all should be - the storage, processing and transportation of water represents a huge consumption of energy.  In California, I know that it represents several percentage points of our total energy usage.

Finally, there is the problem of nutrients.  Our modern sewage systems take them to where they shouldn't be (waterways) and removes them where they should (the agricultural cycle). We are spoiled with cheap fertilizers and forget that these are only a phasing phase. Mined phosphorus is probably near its peak production, and there is no substitute.

What does this mean for individuals and the dilemma of whether to flush?

First, I think it means that we need to be aware that the problem is much deeper than one of aesthetics, as Umbra would have it.

Second, even though most of us in the developed world are stuck with a modern sewage infrastructure, there are many improvements that can and are being made. 

Third, there is the challenge of bringing a messy issue to the attention of the public. This may involve not flushing in public restrooms, or actions that are more in-your-face.  Customs change. In the South, it was concerned impolite for guests to criticize their hosts for openly whipping or mistreating their slaves.  In our modern age, the equivalent is our thoughtless waste.

Social change does not come easily.

Bart
Energy Bulletin

I think that it is criminal in a time of increasing water shortages and scarcity to assume that each time you urinate 3-5 gallons of good water should be lost. 

Unless you have some kind of auto-immune deficiency etc. I cannot imagine a situation where there is a physical health reason you can't be peeing in a toilet someone has peed in. 

Think of it this way, each flush is, say, 3 gallons of water. Every time you don't flush, that saves 3 gallons. Over a day, you could save a minimum of 9 gallons, 63 gallons a week, 252 gallons a month, and 3276 a year. 

Now, multiply that by a person like me, a person with a tiny bladder who drinks a lot of coffee and pees about 9 times over a day (minimum), I can't imagine wasting over 10,000 gallons of water a year on my pee, when it's perfectly harmless (except for the caffeine). 

All numbers aside, I do flush if at a stranger's home, but never flush at say, a rest stop or gas station or at the office.  Following this policy for about 5 years I'll guess has saved the world about 50,000 gallons -- nothing to sneeze about. 

Also, speaking of sneezing, I also use hankies in public. You also can't convince me it's better to cut down virgin forest for my snot rags than to re-use a hankie! 

http://books.google.com/books?id=Az0O28OtWh4C&pg=PA246&lpg=PA246&dq=throw+away+snot+africa&source=bl&ots=ILUO8QO8Mt&sig=J0KXedtij1QtXm1nCRgPMWjqkwE&hl=en&ei=4fYeSpDDDprNlQesgKHHBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5

I have to agree that flushing the toilet is a horrendous waste.  I only do that around lady company, where even "toilet seat etiquette" is a big deal.  Left to my own err, devices, I'll flush every three pees, go outside, or a night when nobody is looking, pee off my second story porch.  Very satisfying, by the way, but not suited for cities or snoopy neighbors.

We fish a lot offshore (catch & release) and we only pack along 20 to 30 gallons of water.  It is too valuable to waste on a flush.  We pee right into the ocean.  At the beach, we're miles away from a restroom so hey, you can make jokes about how warm the water is in spots. 

By the way, a good fraction of the municipal freshwater sold in the US is from reservoirs and surface impoundsments.  Don't drink it.  The fish pee in it.

Wedding Ideas

In 1978, he told Dan Rather on 60 Minutes that he was a long-time practitioner of "urine therapy."

But I must confess, after meeting some people outide of the US, many say that Amercians have issues with peeing.  I am pretty sure that us Americans (not me) spend about a billion dollars on trying to mask the ammoniac smell of urine.  There are automatic flushers, scent dispensers, and chemical nightmares just so designed so us Amercians don't have to smell pee.  It's almost commical.  Let's not even get into B.O. consumer products, which I found I was highly allergic to.

There again, Americans have the curious hanit of putting the "flusher" right next to the bathtub.  Many foreigners find this rather curious.  You shit next to where you bathe?  It must be the American Way.

Culturally, we're pretty darn Puritanical about pee, as I think Umbra talked about "bodily excretions."  Gosh you make it sound like a hippopotamus in heat or something.  I'm always on the look-out on the highway because sometimes I'll sneak a pee on the side of the road and some conservative retard will try to call the cops on me or something.  Best not to give them the benefit of the doubt.  It's a big problem and face it, us Americans are freaky about pee.  Poor gals it'e even worse.  H. L. Mencken would have a field day with this topic if he was born more like a hippie instead of being such a jerk. 

In Germany & Sweden they have toilets that separate the urine at source for recycling.  Urine is a valuable source of the non-renewable element phosphorus that all plants need for growth.  I save a cup of pee a week to water my herbs onmy balcony with.

A cotton hany is a definite advantage when you wash your hands  at a public washroom.  No need to waste trees (paper towel) or electricity on handdriers that take ages and seldom dry your hands effectively.  Just dry on your clean hanky & out the door!

With the fears over H1N1 influenza, I definitely think a cotton hanky that can go through the hot wash is superior infection control to soggy paper tissues that sit around in public wastebins.  What's more. even with regular hot washes, my cotton hankies last for years - I have some that are at least 10 years old.