Septic Pet Peeve

[teejk]

Having no paper at all being flushed is why my friends had a system like new after decades...

The leach field was a big expanse of lawn...

Each time the county inspection was done the pumpers always said it was the cleanest they ever come across.

Wisconsin requires inspection by a licensed pumper every 3 years. If the "solid" level gets to 1/3rd they will pump and remove (my guy will pump regardless...removes the bacteria I know but we eat a lot of veggies here and doesn't take long to get the "bugs" back). Modern systems will now be a 3 chamber tank ("stuff" in chamber #1, liquid from chamber #1 into chamber #2 that will contain a filter before it goes to chamber #3 to be pumped out to the field...if everything works there should be nothing other than your pump and whatever your pump float level dictates which at that point should be clear liquid). Fields are now designed to disperse the liquid through out the field equally.

 

[TomSeller]

You guys have me questioning one of life's lessons taught to me by my father when I was knee high. He learned from years of hard living to drop a few well placed sheets of toilet paper on the toilet water before use so the "splash doesn't get ya". He taught me this and I have abided by it my whole adult life. Now I wonder if the toilet paper is overworking my septic tank.

 

[ultrarunner]

There is quite a variety in Toilet Paper...

The expensive "Cotton" paper causes the most problems...

Down at the sewage treatment plant they bale the "Cotton" toilet paper in bales... have to strain and separate it from the effluent.

They also have quite a collection of other things... lots of hypodermic needles, keys, tools... especially plumbing tools!

 

[Pettrix]

Average use is about 100GPD but that depends on age and how much time is spent at home.

The 100GPD is for someone who works away from the home and is gone 10-12 hours per day. For those who work at home or are retired, the GPD is around 150GPD per person.

 

[CalG]

Excessive water use in my opinion.
I predict water and energy will be precipitate (note the word play) the next "civil war" (not necessarily and armed conflict)
here in the US. That is if politics doesn't get in the way ;-)

Act responsibly! 150 gallons a day is NOT responsible, it is reprehensible.

My "Pet Peeve" is toward those who would accept that level of use as sustainable.

 

[ultrarunner]

That is amazing number of gallons per day... especially in the Desert of the Southwest.

California statewide R-GPCD average for February was 76.7 gallons per person per day, a slight increase from January when the statewide average use was 73.1 gallons per person per day.

At the low end, the San Francisco Bay hydrologic region averaged 57.9 gallons per person per day.

On the high end, the Colorado River hydrologic region averaged 165.6 gallons per person per day.

A handful of suppliers have reached R-GPCD levels below 45.

Most of those I know are at 50 gpd per person and this includes water for plants, pets, etc.

Neighbors have a swimming pool and bring in tanker trucks to fill it.

 

[Wagtail]

Well, I've been reading this thread and simultaneously shaking my head at what you, in N.A., have to put up with or deal with when it comes to government oversight and inspections.

Honestly? Constant mandated inspections and pump-outs!? It's a bloody, legislated, cash-grab.

I have a simple 2-chamber, gravity fed, concrete septic tank that feeds to a simple french field (separate grey water field). The Shire Council probably signed off on the system back when the house was built around '94. I bought it in '98 and had tenants here until I retired here in late '12. Three months ago, for the first time, I had the tank pumped due to heavy rain that caused a wee bit of back-up. When the truck came a few days later and the lid was opened, they said everything was fine and healthy, the tank wasn't actually full but we're here so we'll pump it.

"See you in another 20 years."

What are you blokes putting up with?!?

 

[teejk]

Well, I've been reading this thread and simultaneously shaking my head at what you, in N.A., have to put up with or deal with when it comes to government oversight and inspections.

Honestly? Constant mandated inspections and pump-outs!? It's a bloody, legislated, cash-grab.

I have a simple 2-chamber, gravity fed, concrete septic tank that feeds to a simple french field (separate grey water field). The Shire Council probably signed off on the system back when the house was built around '94. I bought it in '98 and had tenants here until I retired here in late '12. Three months ago, for the first time, I had the tank pumped due to heavy rain that caused a wee bit of back-up. When the truck came a few days later and the lid was opened, they said everything was fine and healthy, the tank wasn't actually full but we're here so we'll pump it.

"See you in another 20 years."

What are you blokes putting up with?!?

There is a very vocal minority (we have a lot of those here) that would prohibit rural living if they could so they do whatever they can to make it an expensive proposition. In this case they disguised it as protecting the ground water.

 

[kevin37b]

It is called EPA. They are costing this country more money than they can ever save . This is another example of government HUA ! I work construction and the miles of that worthless ******* silt fence is beyond comprehension !I could rant for days on what I see .

 

[dmccarty]

Just saying that a typical comfortable size home with several people and a yard are very use to using a 100 gpd in drought stricken California.

In Washington, my Septic was "Sized" by the county based on the number of bedrooms.

In NC, the septic system is sized by the number of bedrooms with the assumption that each bedroom holds two people. We have a three bedroom house with a study than can be turned into a bedroom. Per code we could have just put in a septic system for three bedrooms but that would have been short sighted so we have a four bedroom system. I did not bother to get quotes for a three vs four bedroom system because the cost would have been minimal.

But how many houses these days have two people per bedroom? Danged few. So our septic system is sized to handle eight people and we have four in the house. I think most of the new construction is going to have systems that are well over capacity than actual usage.

Best I can tell our water usage is about 50 GPPPD. We have low flow toilet and shower heads. The dishwasher and clothes washer uses very little water, something like 10 gallons per load. We spent two weeks on a boat this summer and I was filling up the fresh water tanks. Doing the math it looked like we were using about 20 GPPPD. We did some laundry and the boat used fresh water to flush toilets. We would have used less water if the shower heads were a bit more restricted.

Later,
Dan