Different septic question(a "what if")

[time]

I've been wondering about this for awhile.

Here it is required to use infiltrators for drain field because we sit on a vast aquafer. Waste water must evaporate up and not run down into ground water.

Houses with plumbed basements have septic tanks very deep under ground, around 7'. Infiltraters must be no lower than 4' deep to work properly so a pump system is required to pump waste water up from septic tank to the drain field.

So what happens when power goes out for a good lenght of time?

Granted, well pumps won't be working either so there will be less water going into the house but it won't take much before the system is backed up.

[Cabin Fever]

First of all, Infiltrator chambers are no more efficient at evaporating wastewater than a gravel-filled trench is. Besides, even if all the water evaporated, the nutrients/pathogens would still be in the soil waiting for the next rainfall to move them downward toward the aquifer.

We have a plumbed basement and a shallow septic tank. Our basement wastewater is pumped "up" to the septic tank via a pit and sump pump. The upstairs wastewater flows by gravity to the septic tank. Wastewater from the septic tank flows by gravity to our drainfield.

Minnesota code requires that septic tanks not be buried too deep because they are too hard to service if the septic tank pumper has to dig down seven feet to remove the tank's manhole. Minnesota code also requires that the bottom of any drainfield trench be no deeper than 48" below the surface regardless of the distribution method used in the trench (eg, infiltrator chambers, gravel, EZFlow, etc).

In your case, "what happens when if the electricitygoes out?" You stop using water. If you don't the wastewater will start coming up throught the basement floor drains.

[time]

I don't know about efficiency, I only know that infiltrators are required. You can't even buy piping for any other method at local suppliers.

The two basement houses I helped with both had deep septic tanks and field drains done prior to the code requirement of shallow drain field. Septic tanks can stay deep but if repairs are done on drain field it must be made shallow with pump installed.

My tank is not deep but I still use a pipe the size of the manhole to bring the manhole cover to the surface. I've found that many people neglect pumping the tank periodicly when they have to tear up the yard to do so.

But yeah, no electricity means no water in the house except for drinking. Not a problem short term but could be a big problem long term.

[Cabin Fever]

Originally Posted by time

....My tank is not deep but I still use a pipe the size of the manhole to bring the manhole cover to the surface....

Yep, that's the best way to do it. Make sure the lid on the manhole is either locked down or too heavy for kids to lift it.

Ya know, I never heard of any jurisdiction requiring the use of any specific product. I wonder if someone in your county government does have a relative who owns the Infiltrator company...or at least have stock in it. Hummmm.....

I cannot think of any good reason for requiring the use of chambers.

[Pouncer]

I'm with you there, Cabin Fever....nearly all "requirements" will lay out specifics, and then say something like "or equivalent".

I am so thankful my entire system is gravity! Of course, with no power there won't be much going down the drains if we have to haul it.......

[plumbob]

sewage ejector pumps are avaliable with battery backup .. pricey, but avaiable. plumbbob

[meanwhile]

Can you build an Out House to use if the power goes out? We have three Out Houses and they work fine. We do have indoor plumbing but we use the Out Houses near the hiking paths and one near a Camping Cabin. They do not smell bad and since we do not use them daily, they never need shoveling out - it just rots.

Last winter our power was out for three days and the first day we did use buckets of water to dump in the indoor toilet but after that - we walked out to the Out House and I was thankful we had it.

[Pink_Carnation]

Our set up was a mound system so we needed electricity to pump it. We had 3 tanks and the third one was where it got pumped from so if we hadn't been using much water it might be practically empty or it might not if we had used a lot of water. So in any given power outage we could have up to 1000gal. of space or so. Even when the power was out for a week on city water we never had a problem of exceding the amount that was available.

I would expect that the tank set up would be a lot like that one.

[Grandmotherbear]

meanwhile- thundermugs doublelined w/plastic trash bags + kitty litter. Adult diapers go into the standard trash. Why not emergency potty arrangements?

[Forerunner]

Case in point.

Modern septic "laws" both handicap the homesteader while encouraging the challenged to build in the most unsuitable locations.

Build or refurbish so when the power goes off, you have a contingency plan.
Better....just refurbish to implement the sustainable contingency plan now and forget about it.

[oregon woodsmok]

Generator.

[Cabin Fever]

Originally Posted by oregon woodsmok

Generator.

What do you do when your gasoline preps run out?

We're using the outhouse and saving all of our gasoline stockpile for the chainsaws.