Cirrus

MVR nomadic water conserving bathroom.

Cirrus MVR is a re-locatable modular bathroom built around a central water recycling and purifying unit. The stainless steel module is equipped with a built-in bath, shower, toilet and hand basin. The design intention is to create a bathroom that provides all the services for contemporary bathing and ablutions while using a fraction of the water that current bathroom fittings require. Cirrus MVR is a design response for today’s changing climate in Australia. With the growing scarcity of water and the need to protect our environment we wanted to develop easy to use tools for the bathroom that also safe guard our natural resources. Cirrus MVR has its own internal weather cycle to continuously produce fresh water using the grey water output from the bath, shower and hand-basin. This cycle replicates the sun’s sterilising rays and the cloud’s distilling of rainwater. To do this we have carefully researched robust water and energy saving technologies used in the chemical, medical and food processing industries and packaged them together in a domestic scale integrated bathroom appliance.

Mechanical Vapour recompression
At the heart of Cirrus MVR is a mechanical vapour recompression system that collects water from the shower, bath and hand basin and purifies and distils it before storing it in a 200 litre tank ready for reuse. Using MVR technology this distilling and purification can be done very quickly and with minimum energy. The MVR system can continuously purify and distil water as it is being used in the bathroom. MVR works on the principle of saving time and energy to boil water by boiling it in a partial vacuum. By boiling water in a vacuum, like boiling a cup of tea on the top of Mount Everest, boiling occurs at a lower temperature due to the lower atmospheric pressure, requiring much less energy. To ensure that the recycled water is also sterilised it is first passed through an in-line ultra violet light source. The sterilised and distilled water, now potable, is stored in the holding tank. Cirrus MVR only needs water from an external source to top up the tank to replace water used for flushing the toilet or loses due to evaporation.

A re-locatable and flexible service.
The bathroom module can be rolled into any serviced space to make it habitable, either as a living, working or retail space. It can be connected via flexible hoses and electrical cabling to traditional plumbing and electrical service outlets or to a flexible dry-break connection service system. All the sanitary fittings can be folded away to allow for flexible use of the surrounding space and for ease of transport. The toilet pan and shower-head retract into the main body and the bath folds up into the shower recess.

Water efficient fittings
The bathroom systems are designed to minimise water usage. The fitting profiles are designed to reduce water capacity for effective use by up to 50% over traditional fittings. The design cross-sections of the bath and basin have been carefully reduced through ergonomic study to do away with water holding space that is non-functional, without sacrificing comfort or functionality. The toilet uses ‘dry toilet’ technology, using only 15% of the water required by a traditional toilet. The unit features a maceration pump system to liquefy solid waste for efficient disposal and ensure effective flushing with minimum water use. The plumbing cross-section for the sewage outlet is thus reduced to 32mm eliminating the need for space wasting traditional rigid waste pipes.