Ponding septage from a failed cesspool — now on a neighbor’s property — caused homeowner Jim Noga to research wastewater treatment options 20 years ago. His single-family, two-bedroom home in Gloucester, Massachusetts, was less than 50 feet from the Atlantic Ocean, and the city was under a state consent decree to reduce nonpoint pollution to its coastal banks.
Noga selected a system from Waterloo Biofilter Systems and hired D.F. Clark in nearby Ipswich to design and install it. When company designer Charles Johnson visited the property, he found site constraints that didn’t meet 11 regulations. However, the biofilter’s ability to reduce
