Sewage disposal : report of a committee appointed by the President of the Local Government Board to inquire into the several modes of treating town sewage / presented to both Houses of Parliament by command of Her Majesty. Rivers Pollution Prevention Act, 1876 : report to the Local Government Board / by R. Angus Smith.

  • Great Britain. Local Government Board. Committee to Inquire into the Several Modes of Treating Town Sewage.
Date:
1876-1882
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Sewage disposal : report of a committee appointed by the President of the Local Government Board to inquire into the several modes of treating town sewage / presented to both Houses of Parliament by command of Her Majesty. Rivers Pollution Prevention Act, 1876 : report to the Local Government Board / by R. Angus Smith. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    sewers. Where waterclosets are used drains and sewers remove the contents at once. Sewage is injurious in proportion to its age and putridity. Fresh sewage, if removed day' by day, does not, in that time, become putrid; and, consequently, is not so injurious to health as putrid sewage is. In towns completely sewered and drained, and fully supplied with water and waterclosets, there is an unceasing flow along the sewers to the outlet, and the strength of the sewage varies during the day in proportion to the use of water and of waterclosets. The flow is greatest in the morning, at noon, and in the evening. At night the sewers deliver almost pure water, consisting of waste from leaking pipes and taps, with subsoil water. Where waterclosets are in full use, as in London (about 700,000), in Croydon (15,000), in Leamington (about 8,370), in Harro¬ gate (about 1,620), in Cheltenham (about 8,500), and in like proportion in some other towns, the entire of the polluted fluids, with the effete matter of the watercloset, passes at once to the common outlet. The London sewage is at present wasted into the river Thames; but at Croydon, Leamington, Harrogate, and Cheltenham the sewage is purified by irrigation, in each case producing useful crops of grass and vegetables. Where towns are situate on the sea or on the estuaries of tidal rivers sewage is wasted, as at Brighton, at Liverpool, at Sunder¬ land, and even at Edinburgh, where the Water of Leith inter¬ cepting sewer discharges the sewage from a population of about 100,000 by a cast-iron outlet direct into the Frith of Forth. When sewage shall be wasted in preference to utilising it, must depend upon local conditions. The waste of sewage must not, however, produce a nuisance injurious to health, and this wasting of it certainly ought to be cheaper than using it under any of the precipitating and chemical or irrigating processes at present known. Clarification of Sewage. Clarification by deposition in tanks and treatment by chemicals remove detritus and suspended matters from sewage, but, as ex¬ plained, will not fully purify the fluid. This removal of the solids will, however, be an advantage, as a vast mass of matter liable to choke the bed and banks of a stream or river will be removed, which, when allowed to accumulate, becomes putrid and offensive. The streams in Lancashire and Yorkshire are so fully occupied, and water is of such importance, that the manufac¬ turers must have it, though dirty ; steam-boilers being specially constructed to enable steam to be generated from dirty water. The cost of treating sewage in tanks and by chemicals appears to be about 1,500/. per annum for each 1,000,000, or 150/. for each 100,000 gallons per day. The cost is therefore in round numbers about fths of a farthing per ton of the sewage so treated. Any income realised by the sale of the extracted and treated sludge will be in diminution of this cost.