How can the dispersal area be smaller?
Onsite Aerobic Treatment | Kurt Bihler, Bio-Microbics Illinois |
There are several reasons to want to reduce the size of the dispersal area for the property owner. Whether it is cost of land to adding amenities, the typical size of a drain field takes up a lot of room that property owner sees as “open space.” This land can be reclaimed, if instead of a soil-based treatment/disposal system, an “Active Process Control and Treatment” with dispersal of clean water through the soil is installed.
How does soil-based treatment differ with the BioBarrier MBR?
In the case of a typical septic system, the strength of the wastewater can vary tremendously depending on usage, garbage disposals, dishwashers, etc.; and is, in actuality, a pretty loose estimate. This can be mitigated by using an aerobic treatment unit, instead of a septic tank; as long as the ATU is sized properly, working, serviced (including sludge management and pumping), and isn’t killed off by the use of quats.
The design of the system then must allow the BOD5 to be spread out evenly. The demand for oxygen is less than the passive delivery of oxygen in the soil. Otherwise, the soil will clog with anaerobic slime. And finally, after an unknown amount of treatment the water has a low enough BOD5 to pass through the pores in the soil without clogging by aerobic sludge or anaerobic slime determined by the soil’s permeability.
You can get a fairly accurate estimate of permeability, but that has very little weight. In the Illinois Private Sewage Code, the permeability isn’t even weighted linearly. Illinois has category 1 through 12 types. On the most permeable end, Category 2, the actual rate at which the water flows through the soil (Ksat) is 1/170th of the mandated loading rate measured in gallons per square foot per day. At the other extreme, Category 12, in tight clay soils, the state loading rate is 38 times the soil permeability of water (Ksat).
With the soil permeability requirements, typically the Soil-based treatment systems can only use the ranges of 10 to 90 min/inch permeability. With an ultrafiltration membrane system, such as the BioBarrier Membrane BioReactor (MBR), permeate is water; and therefore, the permeability rate has a much wider range.
So, we have 3 unknown variables (strength, BOD5, and permeability rate) and one constant (Ksat soil permeability evaluation). Using aerobic treatment units, pressure dosed fields, drip irrigation, can move those first three variables from unknowns to manageable ranges.
Why Should the BioBarrier MBR be considered?
The national standard certification for Water Reuse has a pass/fail criteria of 10 mg/l of CBOD5 and TSS. Turbidity of less than 5 NTU and E. Coli of less than 14 MPN/100 ml. These parameters fall under Public Health and Safety Standards with the most stringent of approvals for regulatory officials and initiates designed to protect water bodies/water ways.
The BioBarrier test results PASSED with “better than average” marks for non-detectable CBOD5 and TSS, turbidity of 0.25 NTU and E. Coli of 1.3 MPN/100 ml. Basically, the resultant effluent is water, down to the error rate of laboratory tests and a few parts per million of nutrients. Also, it’s free of typical contaminants directly discharging from a wastewater treatment system; i.e. bacteria, parasites, and most viruses.
The control panel is designed to give us a precise quantity, quality, and rate of delivery in the BioBarrier. So with the BioBarrier, we can identify the 3 unknown variables (strength, BOD5, and permeability rate) become constants and sized appropriately with the Ksat Soil Permeability Rate. There is no need to artificially inflate the loading rate over the actual soil permeability.
We do have a safety factor however. If we use the state water usage rates, we size the loading rate at this inflated number * 1.5 – more than what is needed. If we use actual water figures or for a large commercial system, we size the loading rate at over 2 times the soil permeability.
The filtrate dispersal area for the BioBarrier is accurate, and literally hundreds of times safer than any system that uses the soil as part of the treatment process. It’s as permanent as public sewer.
Since the WATER REUSE certification and introduction of the BioBarrier MBR systems, 1000’s are in use now with only requiring maintenance 2 times per year both commercial and residential. Tested at the NSF facility for 1 year with NO maintenance and tested to EU standards in Germany for 9 months with, again, NO maintenance, the power consumption for operation was recorded very low. The first systems have been in operation for over 7 years now were specifically designed for simple, low cost, robust use for blackwater/grey water treatment and water reuse.
Current commercial applications range from wineries to food service, Alaskan resorts to floating fishing camps, ski resort service sections at the base and the summit, potato chip manufacturing to egg washing, etc.
It really is very simple. The BioBarrier does all the treatment that can be done. Therefore, the dispersal are is based on the permeability of water plus a safety factor. And not oversized in order to deal with clogging of biochemical treatment.
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About Kurt Bihler, BioMicrobics Illinois. With more than 35 years’ experience distributing, installing, operating many variants of wastewater treatment processing units, Mr. Bihler has served as an active consultant with Bio-Microbics systems to a variety of industries to achieve and maintain improved wastewater treatment at less cost of the State of Illinois. E-mail kurt@bihlertech.org. website: www.biomi