The cost of urban sanitation solutions: a literature review

The main objective of this paper is to review the literature on and compare the lifecycle costs of full sanitation chain systems in developing cities of Africa and Asia. Overall, financial cost reporting methodologies have been inconsistent and many studies only focus on capital costs or do not report cost data on desludging, transport and treatment. In addition, a comparative analysis of raw cost data across cities and countries would be of low utility, owing to the numerous determinants of costs (e.g. density, level of service) and their high sensitivity to local contexts. To circumvent this, this paper compares the cost ratios between different sanitation systems analysed in a same study. It concludes that conventional sewer systems are in most cases the most expensive sanitation options, followed, in order of cost, by sanitation systems comprising septic tanks, ventilated improved pit latrines (VIP), urine diversion dry toilets and pour-flush pit latrines. The cost of simplified sewer systems is found to be lower than both conventional sewer systems and septic tank-based systems, but lack of data prevented further comparisons with other types of sanitation solutions.