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It always amazes me we don’t better utilize waist material. Burning solids to carbon using collected gases then dump that carbonized material back into the waste water for the carbon to bind up the chemicals. Take the now good grey water and use it in urban landscape. We are so behind on where we should be. What’s holding us back is money and infrastructure. I’ll be so glad when we get off monetary system. Ugh
Feedback on the graphics from 1:35 thru 2:05: the combination of movement of objects/outlines and not-movement of the high-contrast texture/hatching is _very_ disconcerting. (Just those few seconds caused strong nausea.) In the future, either move both or greatly reduce the contrast in the texture. (Later snippets had less movement and so were less bad.) (Apart from that, awesome as always - thanks for doing what you do!)
Please don't stop the garage micro-implementations. I know it takes time to build them for little screen time, but it's a major feature of your channel!
About 15 years ago now, I was working with a construction group that was refurbishing and remodeling a bunch of houses in an older neighborhood in town. After that project had petered out, I became the go to plumber for many of the residents. We got a call for a stopped up drain and realized that the problem was in the home's main drain line. We worked on that drain for HOURS and finally got it flowing... for about a day or so. When he came back to do the drain clearing dance all over again, the next door neighbor said his house was backing up. And then the guy from across the alley said the same thing. Turned out that in the alley, under about 5 feet of built up gravel and dirt was a large manhole that lead to a grinder pump in a tiny little lifting station. The city's water company had no idea that pump was even there. Turned out that the pump had been installed somewhere around 1904 and had been doing its job unnoticed and without any maintenance until 2007 when it finally seized up tighter than Fort Knox. Anyway, they came with a pump truck to clear out the area then installed a brand new pump for that little station that handles about 12 single family houses. I bet the new pump won't last 100 years though.
Over 100 years of work & probably decades without maintenance is super impressive. I work for a water company & pump breakdowns are super common. Do you know what type it was?
@Marshall Hunter I wish I'd been more curious about stuff like that back then, but once the real problem was identified, I stepped back and let the water company do its thing.
Another reason to rely on gravity is you want to minimize the pressurization of sewage to prevent it leaking out. When I started in SCADA work I was told "In the event of a shitsplosion, close your eyes and mouth." Great video, thank you!
As an odor control equipment engineer the last part is particularly fun. From the sewage gas that would blow the manhole covers in LA to the horizontal sewage lines in the north Carolina that run on a giant vacuum pump I've seen plenty of systems that need fun ways to treat that smelly air. It's not a sexy job but we get it done.
When we built our 'new' home (19 years ago), the builder cautioned us that because the lot was a the bottom of a hill, the home would require a 'grinder pump' aka 'macerator pump' to move sewage from our basement through a force main up to the top of the hill about a block away. I was initially hesitant, but in retrospect it has worked very well. The predicted MTTF for the pump is ten years; it went 14 years before it actually failed, but when that happened, it was an immediate crisis. Fortunately, the company that services that equipment in our area was able to replace it within about two hours of when we first called for help. They are noisy, and during a power outage, we know that we can only flush the toiled about 45 times before the reservoir is full. Fortunately, that is a rare occurrence and has only been a real problem one time since we have lived here.
That's the kind of thing I would probably buy a spare for just to have on hand immediately in case of failure. It would suck if they had to order a part.
This is why life cycle expectancy matters. You should have replaced it preemptively so it doesn't turn into an emergency. This is just like sump pumps. They get replaced every 7 years no questions asked.
@@TheZooloo10 the way these work is that the waste water from your home goes into a pit, that pit gets drained by the macerator pump. So if you knew the pump failed, big if there, you could stop producing wastewater until you got it repaired. I've seen it many times where the homeowner doesn't know it's failed and therefore you've got a sewage leak issue now.
Great video! Dealing regularly with molten gob of "pump killer" dental floss which people often flush down the toilet... On par or worse than "flushable" wipes. Confined space entry to clean screens is truly a thankless job. Thanks to all the wastewater infrastructure maintenance ops for keeping the product return department flowing!!!
I remember the PSAs decades ago where a family was being scolded by the narrator for the things they sent down the drain, like trash, (unmacerated) food, cigarette butts, fat and grease, diapers, and so on. They really made an impression on me back then, just like Daffy Duck teaching about stove safety, smoke detectors and evacuation plans. - Maybe it's time for some "influencers" to actually do something positive with their influence and put out useful information like those old commercials did.
We should stop flushing any solid waste at . Any carbon based solid waste should be collected and be pyrolized in a furnace. Resulting bio char can be reused to fire the furnace. Electrostatic smoke scrubber will eliminate exhaust particulates and prevent smog
I really appreciate these Wastewater videos. As a wastewater professional myself, it's great to see an educational and professionally put together video that talks about the things people don't typically think about once they press the flush button.
As a sanitation senior pumping plant operator I appreciate you making this and other sewer related videos. I show them to the new guys, and it saves a ton of questions.
0:01 "Fun" fact: The 5-day incubation for BOD (Biochemical Oxygen Demand) that we use for environmental monitoring today is directly based on the amount of time it would take for the sewage from this lift sation to make its way down the Thames to the sea.
I have been interning for a civil engineering water resources company in Southern California for the past 4 months and all I’ve worked on thus far is sewer systems. I still haven’t drawn any lift stations, but i have been reviewing the plans and your video has significantly cleared some misunderstandings i had. Many of the project managers are too preoccupied to explain the nitty gritty to an intern and so i diverted to online learning (youtube). And boy i am glad i found your channel. Thank you man. Seriously, please be like a professor or something, you are so good at explaining this stuff.
I think issue is that they "flush" out your house but aren't "sewer safe". And it is surprising that the government that runs most utilities hasn't attempted to stop the usage of so call "flushable" wipes as it is directly costing them money. Must not be expensive enough, or they don't care.
@@jasonreed7522 What isn't surprising is uninformed people spouting their opinions on RU-vid. Small local governments are the ones who are responsible for maintaining those sewer lines, and small local governments don't have the power to force the hand of multinational corporations.
I work in Northern California at a sewage treatment plant as an operator and I always enjoy watching well put together videos like these as refreshers! They’re simple and well explained! Even when I go on vacations with my wife I keep my eyes open for treatment plants and pump stations! It’s burned into my psychi
Good of Grady to shine a light on the largely unknown and underappreciated lift stations and the longsuffering joes and janes that keep them running. Factoid: There is a series of small sewer lift station in Yosemite Valley, CA (The part of Yosemite National Park that most tourist visit). Although a river flows through it the "fall" isn't enough for sewage to flow down valley by gravity alone. The massive flood of New Year's Eve and Day 1997 wreaked havoc to much infrastructure on the valley floor. Not only did the flood fill the sewer laterals/mains with sand it also knocked out multiple lift stations. The lift stations were designed and built to endure flood with a concrete pill box structure and gasketed doors like warships and submarines. However, over the decade's penetrations had been made for things like conduit entry so the "watertight design" became severely compromised. Therefore, repair and renovation were enormous.
Thank you for the video. Haven't done any engineering for a long time, but my sister is on the sewer board of a small town in Oregon. She's always telling my stories of the cluelessness of the town council on how city money should be spent. And there's no shortage of cluelessness of the seasonal inhabitants on what makes the town run. Sewer, water, power, road maintenance, lighting, snow removal - there's plenty to be maintained.
Love this stuff! As a wastewater engineer, I enjoy seeing this kind of information being presented to the general public in an entertaining way. Thanks!
Designed many lift stations in my 38 years of wastewater engineering. You have done an excellent job of explaining the issues involved for the general public that have no idea what goes into transporting and treating wastewater. Look forward to your videos on treatment.
@@leonfa259 tried to stay away from grinder pumps instead selected pumps that could handle large solids if at all possible. Did occasional use muffin monsters which ground up large solids using rotating grinding teeth prior to pumps but mostly relied on screens to remove hard to deal with solids. Of course that required more maintenance etc. sometimes there are just no easy answers. Grinding up solids can cause issues with treatment units since the first step in most instances is clarification of the wastewater by settling and larger stuff settles more readily.
They work OK until the edge goes off the cutters, then they jam up readily. Condoms can also be a problem as they stretch and can cause a stall, tripping the motor.
@@victorcroasdale4992 yeah they do have problems. Never was a big fan and that is why I stayed away from them. You had to watch the headless through the units in design also.
@@1945d18 Generally grinder pumps were the smallest sizes, intended for small flows and (IIRC) quite low heads. I also suspect they were horribly inefficient hydraulically, though of course that didn't matter much with small pumps. Could also have used vortex pumps but their efficiencies were terrible. I never had occasion to use either, instead used (mostly) pumps with open single-channel impellers. I was happier with bigger pumps for bigger flows where impeller solids clearance was not an issue. (Retired wastewater engineer here).
I think my favorite thing about your videos is how you talk. Not the words specifically as much as the tone and inflection and the fact that the way you talk comes off very genuine rather than lecturing or boring or as if you were just reciting from memory rather than actively engaged with the subjects you talk about. It comes off very refreshing and happy and I'm here for it haha
I started my career building lift station control panels. Fun job for a 19 year old. Very grateful for that experience. BTW, thank God for the chopper pump!
My first day as a wastewater operator the supervisor took me to show me the sludge dewatering building and I said “Man that smells bad”. His response was “ that’s the smell of money”. Wastewater treatment operators make pretty good money. Obviously the supervisor makes even more.
Thanks. I was recently appointed to the Board of Public Affairs. This has given me a better understanding of the lift stations that I was shown on my tour.
"It's asinine that marketing ANYTHING as "flushable" isn't outlawed" - So what should people do with their feces-covered toilet paper? Throw it in the wastebasket? Or are you suggesting that people shouldn't use toilet paper and should instead walk around with caked-on feces and urine? Or are you going with option C and suggesting that people should scrape the waste away with their hands and them immediately shower every time they use the toilet?
Ohh, yes! Good topic as always Grady! Regarding Victorian engineering and waste management, any chance you'll make one video on the upside-down egg profile sewage pipes/tunnels that connected to London's Victorian sewage station? Regarding the burritos, both your skills are better than mine. So I'll say both seemed great to me! Say hi to the lovely family and say they're a great addition to the commercial part of the video! The engineer to be seemed really happy with the structural integrity of that cardboard box! Take care and stay safe!
The models that you put together for your videos must take a long time, but they set you apart from the other channels that use whiteboards or non functional models. They’re really cool, please keep it up!
I picked the wrong video to watch while drinking my iced coffee. In all seriousness, I now know what's inside the many little lift stations I saw all over the place when I lived in Florida. They're very common, particularly on barrier islands. It's also interesting to see what you can do when installing a wastewater system for a city in the late 20th century. Cape Coral relied on individual wells and septic tanks until many wells began to run dry in the 1970s. The city opened one of the first reverse osmosis water treatment facilities for drinking water. For wastewater, they provide non-potable, reclaimed water from the treatment system to businesses and homes for landscape irrigation, saving an estimated 20 billion gallons of water over a 25-year period. The city is still expanding the water and sewer systems, and will be for several years to come. Too bad the original developers in 1957 didn't care to put water and sewer mains under the giant grid of streets and canals in the first place.
Another great video. Just wanted to say thanks for making these videos, I'm certainly learning a lot and gaining awareness of the civil engineering wonders that surround us every day. I really appreciate the style of your videos. The length seems just about right; I find watching any of your videos a worthwhile investment of time. Best wishes and good luck; I hope you continues these videos into the future.
Cool. Thanks for showing me that my friends and I used to hang out on top of a poop chute as kids. Cool. Cool cool cool. Cool. Veeeeery cool. I’m fine. It’s fine. No big deal. Basically my best friend and I lived at opposite ends of a really long street in FL and halfway there was a big hump in the path with a circular pad of cement, those metal doors, and one of those boxes with a light that would flash after a storm. Literally I saw the exact model and setup in the video! We assumed it was for storm water and flooding which is common in FL. Man. I can’t wait to tell Sam our meeting spot and snack hang was a big ol poo toob!
Chain and disk pumps used to be used - a continuous loop of chain which is pulled by an engine or animals with disks that fit inside a riser pipe. Also Archimedes screw pumps where the heights are to great - big ones can lift anything! Also I can recommend the Drain Addict RU-vid channel if you want to see the practicalities of lifting sewage!
I suspect that the old school beam engines were rather robust for this task too because of their linear reciprocating action. I figured their ability to simply lift the entire cylinder of water straight up would be well suited to this. Seems like if designed with the cylinder and the pipes all being the same diameter almost anything that fits through the pipe should pass the mechanism too well except I suppose you have the lift rod that pulls the piston up to deal with. But that is still far less of a constriction than an impeller creates. Then again guess maybe they weren't as good as they look as it would be easy to convert the torque output from a modern motor or ICE into reciprocating motion like this, converting between linear and circular motion and back is a staple of engineering after all.
Grady, I notice the subtle sepia intro theme and the grayish backgrounds, thank you so much for making your videos more accessible to people who are sensitive to brightness!
After years of following and knowing this is focused on US infrastructure, imagine my surprise when my actual work office was the opening 30 seconds of this video! The Crossness Engines are absolutely beautiful inside, regular tours etc. in South London for anybody reading who may be interested
Some people may be surprised to know that more primitive arrangements still exist in developed countries. I live in Scotland in an area without main sewers. My waste flows out from under my building, down an iron pipe on the beach and into the water. That's it. I'm hoping (with others in my building) to enter the 20th? century soon and install a septic tank.
I wouldn't worry , the water treatment companies regularly dump untreated waste into rivers and the sea ..its a national scandal as there all privatised and pay a lot of shareholder divvies .
I am sending this link to our local waste water treatment plant. It's a smaller facility which can benefit greatly from citizens understanding the WHY behind "do not flush "flush-able wipes". They consistently send out cease and desist request letters, but people are not listening. If people are shown this video when they log in to pay their bill, perhaps just MAYBE they will see why. I say everyone should spend one week working at their local treatment plant. One day of shoveling their own waste will provide extremely valuable life experience regarding what should not go down their drains. 35 years ago I skipped school once. My punishment was shoveling human waste from one of those screened collection basins seen in this video. Only toilet paper has been flushed by me since. I love the wet wipe concept, but they seriously need to alter the material used.
In the city near where I grew up the water treatment plant was far and away the lowest building in the city, so no need for any pumps et al and the plant worked like a charm. Where I live now the water treatment plant sits at the same level as everything else, we had 2 backups into our basement, so they built a new plant last year. Great!
As a colonial, I was shocked to see how blase the UK is about dumping raw sewerage into rivers. Every time it rains heavily a CSO dumps sewerage into the storm drain system and thus to a river.
Nothing much more awe-inspiring than a mother who willing to have another baby! But a close second of course is the way in which we have industrialised our life ‘below’ so that folks can wrinkle their noses and go “yuk” at the thought of something that is totally human and only recently vanished from our sights. Thanks for another nice episode!
After several years in the military ( somewhat alienated from the real world ) I now work in the maintenance of fresh/wastewater pumping and treatment infrastructure of my hometown in Brazil, and I find it all really amazing and ingenious, I really would like to see more videos about wastewater infrastructure coming, just to see the besy practices from the USA and to curiously compare both worlds...
My local pumping station has a tank that sewage flows into. When full the inlet briefly closes and pressurised air is released into the tank to blow all the sewage out. The inlet then opens again once pressure normalises. It takes about 15 seconds for the close-pressure-open cycle. Local councils (UK) used to own the infrastructure so they used different methods from each other. They are all owned by water companies now but it means there is still a mixture of methods used.
We use Vortex Pumps for wastewater treatment, and they can pump anything that fits down the pipe. never had one block so far and I've seen them shift metal parts and rope. could make an interesting video if you made one with a transparent housing!
Used to rent a “trash pump” for construction type stuff, similar to your vortex pump I think; the impeller is open with large clearances, in fact, one I saw only had two blades. Worked great for low pressure/large volume applications.
We had 1 lift station an old Smith & Lovelace. No pumps, it used air pressure, 2 check valves and a poly coated stainless rod maintenance was easy, change oil in the compressors yearly and clean and readjust the stainless rod every 4-6 months
I love these videos. I worked as a civil construction estimator for city underground and site servicing works in a major city. I love your explanation of Sanitary systems for the layman. Thanks a million Grady.
What a fantastic channel this is. Quality practical demonstrations and easy to follow explanations. Thank you for providing such high quality content, it's noticed and appreciated.
I suppose they preach the gospel according to Watt. "Verily I say unto you, low-pressure steam will never amount to anything. High pressure is the way to useful power."
Dude, thank you. I love learning, and you are a fantastic teacher. So efficient. I'm a non educated project superintendent for government projects, and that means I've grown an incredible appreciation for plumbing. Plumbers rule the world!
I'm the engineer inspector at a treatment plant undergoing upgrades and I can't tell you how excited the operator is to have grinder pumps in the way to replace their current set of pumps. I hadn't seen stand alone grinders before, will keep them in mind...
I work for my counties water and sewer utility as a maintenance tech. The stand alone grinders are great! We use them at the influent to the treatment plant and at all of our high flow liftstations. They really help at the lift stations.
Love this one, pumps & shredding are always fun. Also you're literally the only reason I've ever considered signing up for Hello Fresh, so I hope they know they're getting their money's worth out of you lol
I work in utility/building maintenance for a public school. Our middle school is built into a hill, so the lower level is actually sub-grade and below the city sewer. We have a grinder/pump setup to take the waste up to the sewer. The room where that's located is affectionately known as "the stink room". We have to be careful to keep the door shut, or the phones will be blowing up with complaints.
i am currently working on a project for our lift station at our plant, its pretty fun trying to figure out the level and the over all size of the vessel and finding the right equipment to level and to automate the equipment, what I'm tasked to do is create a metering program to turn pumps on and off, at certain levels, and turn off at preset levels. we learned a lot trying to figure out what we are going to use to read the level of our vessel, we were going to use laser, but now we will be using sonar, a very weak lower level of sonar and that is going to take the leveling/metering data over to the PLC and the PLC will automate the whole system to keep it as hands free as possible.
We have several stations that use ultrasonics, but in small wells it can be hard to aim just right to not hit the pumps or cables. We're changing some to radar. They are supposed to be more accurate and easier to aim. Plis,Plus, work with existing PLCs from the ultrasonic and pressure sensors.
Never thought I would understand lift stations so well! Your videos should definitely be used in classes for future environmental engineers like me. Thank you!!!!
Instead of pumps that can clog, or add pressure to pipes and burst, can "archimedes screws" work? Basically moving repeating walls that push water and solids alike forward and upwards?
Nice channel.. I work as a wastewater operator for the last 30 years now at a industrial wastewater plant. Different from a public wastewater plant, but the used technics are almost similar.
We recently had a sewer force main fail nearby my apartment, and it took about a week for the crews to complete repairs. Not bad considering it is located underneath a state highway...
"You know... Poop"... A sentence I never expected from Practical Engineering but that's because I hadn't learned much about the engineering of municipal wastewater treatment. How did this happen and why am I enthralled by it... 😳 Thanks Grady!
Thank you, Grady, for your continued focus on civil infrastructure education! There are lot of machines and constructions surrounding us that we often take for granted, and it is fascinating to learn about their functions through your insightful presentations.
My second home I didn't realize that we pumped raw sewage uphill behind the house. to the County sewer. A very large, submersible pump did the uphill hill pumping....again I had no idea about this until one day the pump alarm went off......well, I had to call a plumber that knew what I was talking about and a few hundred $$$ later all was good again. If I had understood this before buying this place, I would never have bought this home!!!!!! When I sold the house I made sure the real estate agent knew of the situation, but he still had a lot of trouble understanding what the pumping station was for.
As a former waste water treatment plant operator, this video covers all the important points. Obligatory comment(even though it was covered in the video): Flushable wipes cause problems quite literally, down the line.
My hometown had a lift station near a residential neighborhood. Eventually, the increasing odor it produced as more residents moved it prompted the city to completely redo the configuration. It was only located maybe 100 or so yards from the treatment plant. So, they dug an extremely deep wet well at the plant and connected it to the existing lift station so the waste would just flow through the old lift station down to the new wet well. So now all the odors just happen to also be next to the treatment plant odors.
Another banger Grady! Excellent job! Just an FYI, HDD (or Horizontal Directional Drilling) is a much safer, more reliable and less intrusive way to install sewer lines. No need to trench and far fewer limits on the depth you can go.
Not so. I am currently doing a force main and using a maxi rig because of its diameter. I have to close the street to fit all the equipment needed. If i had my choice I would open cut everything and maybe the ocassional Jack and bore because it is mist compact but used for shorter distances. HDD is definetely not good for gravity sewer installation because you need accurate straight line control.
I am an electrician working for a municipality in water and wastewater. You nailed every aspect except one...I've never called them fatbergs. Yet. On Monday you will be 100%
