Hybrid Nature : Sewage Treatment and the Contradictions of the Industrial Ecosystem.
- 1st ed.
- 1 online resource (371 pages)
- Urban and Industrial Environments Series .
- Urban and Industrial Environments Series .
Intro -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Abbreviations -- Introduction -- 1 Natural vs. Artificial: "The Right Way to Dispose of Town Sewage" -- Land Treatment as the Right and Natural Way to Dispose of Sewage -- Naturalizing Biology -- "Nature's Own Methods" -- Contesting the Natural -- Rejecting Bacteria -- Industrializing Biology -- Activated Sludge -- Creating an Ecosystem -- Industrializing the Ecosystem -- 2 Public vs. Private: "Nature Must Be Circumvented" -- The Septic Tank Syndicate -- Activated Sludge Inc. -- Patents and Professionals -- Sewage and the Public Interest -- Public Research -- Monopolizing Natural Processes -- "The Chaos of Pure Science and Natural Processes" -- The Rise of Private Industrial Research -- 3 Craft vs. Science: "Be an Operator, Not a Valve Turner" -- Process Control -- Process Control in Sewage Treatment -- "Skilled Control of the Process Will Be Essential" -- "A Living System" -- An "Unsavoury" Occupation -- "If Only We Could Measure It" -- The Visible and the Invisible -- Complexity and Alienation -- 4 Profit vs. Purification: "Sewage Is Something to Be Got Rid Of" -- The "Search for 'El Dorado' in the Cities' Sewers" -- Crossness and Barking -- "A Mischievous Error" -- The Rise of Biological Treatment -- Profit and Purification in America -- Milwaukee and "Sewer Socialism" -- MilorganiteŽ -- "Plus Values" -- "A Fancy Name...Helps a Lot" -- "We Are a Sanitary Facility" -- 5 The Contradictions Continue: Sewage Treatment since the Clean Water Act -- Profit vs. Purification -- Craft vs. Science -- Public vs. Private -- Natural vs. Artificial -- Biological Sewage Treatment in the Twenty-first Century -- 6 From Sewage to Biotech: "What We Have before Us Is an Industrial Product" -- Biotechnology and the Contradictions of the Industrial Ecosystem -- The Expanding Industrial Ecosystem. Hybridizing Sewage, Biotechnology, and Nature -- 7 Conclusion: The Living MachineŽ -- Notes -- Introduction -- 1 Natural vs. Artificial -- 2 Public vs. Private -- 3 Craft vs. Science -- 4 Profit vs. Purification -- 5 The Contradictions Continue -- 6 From Sewage to Biotech -- 7 Conclusion -- Selected Bibliography -- Index -- Urban and Industrial Environments Series.
A history of of the industrial ecosystem that focuses on the biological sewage treatment plant as an early example.