A wildly popular garlic-centered annual agricultural festival in Orange plans to up the ante on its already sustainable practices by recycling attendees' urine.



The North Quabbin Garlic & Arts Festival website says special, urine-only portable toilets at this year's event will filter nutrients into the soil. The festival's founder, Deborah Habib, told the Telegram & Gazette she's never heard of a festival doing such a thing.



An environmental nonprofit and septic company plan to join forces to collect "approximately 1,200 gallons of urine at the festival, sanitize it with a mobile pasteurizing unit and apply the urine to the grassy, festival fields afterwards," according to the festival's website.



The organization heading up the effort is Brattleboro, Vt., nonprofit Rich Earth Institute. The institute's website contains a plethora of details about how urine can actually be a serviceable fertilizer.



According to the website, "Our 'liquid gold' is an abundant source of sustainable fertilizer, but we currently flush it into sewers where it causes nutrient pollution that is costing municipalities billions to remediate."



People with the institute plan to attend the event to stand by the special porto-potties to inform attendees of their purpose.



Urine contains nitrogen and phosphorus, among other things.



The event is held in a hayfield at Forster's Farm, 60 Chestnut Hill Rd. in Orange. All the recycled urine will be used to fertilize the field. This year marks the 19th anniversary of the event.

Courtesy Rich Earth Institute