Salon: L.A. to serve toilet water. One proposal for the Southern California water shortage. In the ’70’s, I worked briefly for an environmental concern that promoted wastewater recycling. But they were talking about “grey water” — bath-, sink- and laundry-drainage. In this scheme, waterless composting toilets keep human waste contamination out of the recycling stream and “stop the five-gallon flush”; seemed like a good idea then and now. In recent years, I’ve been delighted to discover this system in use at several of the Appalachian Mountain Club’s backcountry huts in the White Mountains, but imagine the economy of scale and public acceptance that could come from its LA-wide introduction!