One of our biggest challenges in the onsite industry is creating a management infrastructure to keep up with rapidly developing treatment technologies.
Technology manufacturers have made a significant effort to train practitioners on their proprietary products. And organizations such as Consortium of Institutes for Decentralized Wastewater Treatment (CIDWT) have developed curriculums providing a broader perspective.
Still, we haven’t connected the dots to link up all the elements of training into a cohesive training and certification effort. As a consequence, we see a significant rate of premature advanced treatment system malfunction and failure.
With the mandatory O&M requirements accompanying NSF/ANSI Standard 40 product certification, many practitioners get good training on specific technologies, but they haven’t received adequate training to understand how an integrated system of components work together.
Using the CIDWT materials, we learn to think in terms of the treatment train, where each individual component plays an integral role in the system, and where the components have separate and equal O&M requirements.
This occasional “O&M Matters” series in Onsite Installer will address each component that may be included in a treatment train and enumerate each item’s basic O&M requirements. The aim is to spur discussions on what level of training professionals need as we move toward an industry-recognized certification program.
Where does it start?
The first step to understanding the O&M needs of any onsite treatment system is to understand the wastewater process. Again, breaking the system down into components and viewing it as a treatment train is the best way to put things into perspective. This approach helps practitioners evaluate the O&M needs of a system and then communicate those needs to the owner.
What would you consider to be the first component of any onsite system? How about the source? That would be the system users and the facilities that generate the wastewater. The waste habits of the system users and the type and condition of plumbing fixtures can make or break any system. And you, the onsite practitioner, are the key to this important component.
What can I do?
You all are probably saying, “Right — I can control what the users are putting down the drain.” Maybe not, but what you can do is educate owners on the impact their habits have on the system, physically and financially. People listen when you talk money!
Where do you start? Upon setting up any service agreement, it is a good idea to sit down with the system owner to discuss your service agreement terms and to inform them of their role in assuring a long, effective system life. You might call it a shared responsibility approach. Here are some of the issues you might discuss:
• Excessive water use can overload systems.
• Garbage disposals create unwanted solids in the system.
• Toilets are not good wastebaskets.
• Water softener waste should not go into the system.
• Toxic materials put down the drain can kill a system and pollute groundwater.
• Leaky plumbing fixtures create excess wastewater.
• Improper landscaping and landscape maintenance can create problems.
• Rodents and pets digging for rodents can damage systems.
• Driving or parking on system components can cause damage.
• Livestock atop the system can cause soil compaction and erosion.
Yes, this information and more is available on a number of Web sites, publications and handouts that you could just mail or give to the owner. However, nothing is as effective as a good, face-to-face discussion. This is the time to begin to show your value to the client — it is time well spent. And about those Web sites, publications and handouts: use them. They show the care and professionalism of our fast-growing industry.
What will I learn from this series?
This O&M Matters series will take you for a ride on the treatment train. We will embark from the source and travel to the pretreatment septic tank, then on to the gravity soil treatment area. We’ll visit a pump tank in a pump-to-gravity system, move on to a low-pressure pipe soil treatment area, then explore a range of advanced treatment options, including media filters, aerobic treatment units, disinfection options, and drip dispersal systems. Along the way, we’ll have a discussion on system controls.
Stay tuned for an educational ride.
Kit Rosefield is an adjunct instructor at Columbia Community College and a trainer for NAWT and the California Onsite Wastewater Association. His company, Onsite Wastewater Management in Mi Wuk Village, Calif., has a consumer education service at www.septicguy.com. Reach him at 209/770-6760 or kit@septicguy.com.
