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Alternative Design Sewage Treatment Systems for Residential and other Applications InspectAPedia®  -     Residential sewage treatment system design & selection guide Alternative septic system design guidelines

This document reviews sewage treatment systems for residential properties and certain other applications,, and explains the difference beween a "sewage treatment system" and other alternative septic system and wastewater treatment designs such as conventional tank and drainfield or aerobic septic systems. This document is a chapter of Inspecting, Testing, & Maintaining Residential Septic Systems an online book on septic systems.

Citation of this article by reference to this website and brief quotation for the sole purpose of review are permitted. Use of this information at other websites, in books or pamphlets for sale is reserved to the author.

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Sewage Treatment Systems

This text on residential type sewage treatment systems is in collection and editing.

"Sewage Treatment System" is used by some wastewater treatment product suppliers and designers to distinguish between conventional single-residence wastewater treatment and disposal systems such as a tank and drainfield or an aerobic treatment unit or sand bed filter, and systems which either

1.) completely treat raw sewage to provide an effluent output sufficiently sanitary to discharge to an unregulated surface or to a waterway, or

2.) systems which serve clusters of residential homes. Reading various manufacturer's language, we have found such inconsistent language on this term that we are researching and collecting data to clear up this confusion. It will appear here.

See our full list of sewage treatment and septic system design articles just below.

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• Ten Steps to Keeping a Septic System Working, suggestions from the U.S. EPA, edits and additions by DJF
• What is a Septic System An Engineer's View & Septic System FAQ's

Books & Articles on Building & Environmental Inspection, Testing, Diagnosis, & Repair

• Our recommended books about building design, inspection, and repair, and about indoor environment testing, diagnosis, and cleanup are at the InspectAPedia Bookstore.
• The Septic System Information Website home page for this topic
• Septic Systems Inspection, Testing, & Maintenance- online textbook. Detailed how to inspect, maintain, repair information
• The Home Buyer's Guide to Septic Systems
• Septic Tank Pumping Guide: When, Why, How to pump the septic tank
• Home & Outdoor Living Water Requirements
• Septic Tank Capacity vs Usage in Daily Gallons of Wastewater Flow, calculating required septic tank size, calculating septic tank volume from size measurements
• How Big Should the Leach Field Be? - table of soil percolation rate vs. field size
• Septic System Drainfield Absorption System Biomat Formation - what leads to drain field clogging and expensive drainfield repairs
• Table of Required Septic & Well Clearances: Distances Between Septic System & Wells, Streams, Trees, etc.
• Ten Steps to Keeping a Septic System Working, suggestions from the U.S. EPA, edits and additions by DJF
• Pennsylvania State Fact Sheets relating to domestic wastewater treatment systems include
• Pennsylvania State Wastewater Treatment Fact Sheet SW-161, Septic System Failure: Diagnosis and Treatment
• Pennsylvania State Wastewater Treatment Fact Sheet SW-162, The Soil Media and the Percolation Test
• Pennsylvania State Wastewater Treatment Fact Sheet SW-l64, Mound Systems for Wastewater Treatment
• Pennsylvania State Wastewater Treatment Fact Sheet SW-165, Septic Tank-Soil Absorption Systems
• Document Sources used for this web page include but are not limited to: Agricultural Fact Sheet #SW-161 "Septic Tank Pumping," by Paul D. Robillard and Kelli S. Martin. Penn State College of Agriculture - Cooperative Extension, edited and annotated by Dan Friedman (Thanks: to Bob Mackey for proofreading the original source material.)
• ...

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