It seems that money does not smell … In Korea, toilets turn human feces into digital money.
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Time issilver and in South Korea, the one spent on the toilet bowl can save money. It was based on our “big commission” needs that Professor Cho Jae-weon, from the Ulsan National University of Science and Technology (UNIST) and research director at the Waldon Center, had the idea of creating a digital currency. Its concept called Feces Standard Money allows to transform faeces in a virtual currency bearing the name of Ggool. Nothing to do with the Internet giant, this word means “honey” in Korean. And it is the decomposition of our excrement that develops the precious nectar.
Also in the register of flowers and bees, the professor developed three toilets that he called BeeVi, the bee contraction and vision. The cuvettes suck the feces in a reservoir where they turn into methane by decomposition. the gas is then burned to be used as bioenergy. This could be used to heat water, but also to create this Ggool virtual currency. As nothing is really lost, the ultimate waste can be used as manure.
One poo = 1.2 km by electric car
After each passage on the throne, we can thus scan a QR-Code to collect a maximum of 10 Ggool per day. 10 Ggool is the monetary unit that would correspond to our average daily production of fecal matter according to the professor. A value that everyone, regardless of their social status or age, can generate, emphasizes the scientist. With this currency, it is possible to shop at the Ggool Market, a university shop and in about twenty stores in Ulsan. affiliates to this programme. About 1,000 people who participate in this project by going to the toilet use this currency to “fuel the machine” and buy a coffee, noodle soup, or fruit.
More than the story of this money not as dirty as one might imagine, it is the daily production in energy that a person can generate by switching to bathroom which amazes. Thus, the 500 grams of faeces expelled on average by one person, allow the production of about 0.5 kWh of electricity according to the scientist’s calculations. An amount of energy that could run a car electric over a distance of 1.2 kilometers according to him.
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